Etymology

gentlewoman

G2E1N1T1L1E1W4O1M3A1N1

Today it means: A woman of the nobility. Full definition →

Middle English gentilwoman
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Middle English · inherited fromgentilwoman
  2. English todaygentlewoman

From Middle English gentilwoman, modelled after gentilman (“gentleman”), equivalent to gentle + -woman.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.