Beau vs Mistress - What's the difference?
beau | mistress | Related terms |
(dated) A man with a reputation for fine dress and etiquette; a dandy or fop.
* 1811 , Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility , chapter 21
(dated) A male lover; a boyfriend.
* 1917 , Kate Douglas Wiggin, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm , p. 142:
* 2009 , Philippa Bourke, Monsters and Critics [http://www.monstersandcritics.com/people/news/article_1518335.php/Kristin-Davis-takes-cover-on-beach-with-beau#ixzz0ZRsqa5SS], Dec 10, 2009:
A male escort.
A woman, specifically one with great control, authority or ownership.
* , chapter=19
, title= A female teacher.
A female partner in an extramarital relationship, generally including sexual relations.
A dominatrix.
* 2006 , Amelia May Kingston, The Triumph of Hope (page 376)
A woman well skilled in anything, or having the mastery over it.
* Addison
A woman regarded with love and devotion; a sweetheart.
(Scotland) A married woman; a wife.
* Sir (Walter Scott)
(obsolete) The jack in the game of bowls.
female companion to a master
Beau is a related term of mistress.
As a proper noun beau
is (male) used since mid-twentieth century.As a noun mistress is
(archaic) used as the title of a married woman before her name now used only in the abbreviated form mrs .beau
English
Noun
(en-noun)- “I do not comprehend the meaning of the word. But this I can say, that if he ever was a beau before he married, he is one still, for there is not the smallest alteration in him.”
- “Oh! dear! one never thinks of married mens’(SIC) being beaux —they have something else to do.”
- Hannah's beau takes all her time 'n' thought, and when she gits a husband her mother'll be out o' sight and out o' mind.
- Kristin Davis has taken time out to enjoy the surf and sand with her Australian beau , photographer Russell James.
See also
* beau- * beautiful * BeauReferences
* English nouns with irregular plurals ----mistress
English
Noun
(es)The Mirror and the Lamp, passage=At the far end of the houses the head gardener stood waiting for his mistress , and he gave her strips of bass to tie up her nosegay. This she did slowly and laboriously, with knuckly old fingers that shook.}}
- As part of BDSM play they can enhance the domineering tread of a mistress or hobble the steps of a slave.
- A letter desires all young wives to make themselves mistresses of Wingate's Arithmetic.
- (Clarendon)
- Several of the neighbouring mistresses had assembled to witness the event of this memorable evening.
- (Beaumont and Fletcher)
Usage notes
In the sexual sense, mistress is narrowly taken to mean a woman involved in a committed'' extramarital relationship (an affair), often supported financially (a kept woman). It is broadly taken to mean a woman involved in an extramarital relationship regardless of the level of commitment, but requires more than a single act of adultery.Tiger Woods Does Not Have 11 “Mistresses”: His many paramours aren’t committed enough to merit that term.by Jesse Sheidlower, '', Dec. 10, 2009.