Meanings
- uncountableThe earning of a household's primary income.
And the key issues that both batterers and battered women identify as triggers to battering are men's successes in breadwinning and the bedroom – the two Bs.
2007, Angela Hattery, Earl Smith, African American families, page 1041 more example
This could have occurred nowhere but in England, where men and sea interpenetrate, so to speak—the sea entering into the life of most men, and the men knowing something or everything about the sea, in the way of amusement, of travel, or of bread-winning.
1898 September, Joseph Conrad, “Youth: a Narrative”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXIV, number DCCCCXCV, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publication Co., page 309Synonyms: breadearning
Synonyms & antonyms
nounThe earning of a household's primary income.
Origin
From bread + winning. Compare West Frisian breawinning (“livelihood”), Dutch broodwinning (“profession”).
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Greek αποχειροβίωτος
- αποχειροβίωτος (apocheirovíotos)Translations
Cite this entry
breadwinning. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/breadwinning
“breadwinning.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/breadwinning. Accessed November 2, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “breadwinning,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/breadwinning.
Source: breadwinning on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.