dame

See also: Dame, damé, dáme, and Damɛ

English

WOTD – 9 December 2018

Etymology

English actress Dame Judi Dench at the 60th British Academy Film Awards in February 2007. Dench was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1988, and thus uses the title “Dame” (sense 1)

From Middle English dame, dam (“(term of address or title of a) woman of rank, lady; mistress of a household; superior of a convent; mother”), from Old French dame (“lady; term of address for a woman; the queen in card games and chess”), from Latin domina (“mistress of the house”), feminine form of dominus (“lord, master, ruler; owner of a residence”), ultimately either from Proto-Indo-European *demh₂- (“to domesticate, tame”) or from Latin domus (“home, house”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *dem- (“to build (up)”)). Doublet of donna.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /deɪm/
• Rhymes: -eɪm

Noun

dame (plural dames)

1. (Britain) Usually capitalized as Dame: a title equivalent to Sir for a female knight.

   Dame Edith Sitwell

2. (Britain) A matron at Eton College.
3. (Britain, theater) In traditional pantomime: a melodramatic female often played by a man in drag.
4. (US, dated, informal, slightly derogatory) A woman.
   • 1903 March, Guy Wetmore Carryl, The Lieutenant-Governor: A Novel, Boston, Mass.; New York, N.Y.: Houghton, Mifflin and Company; Riverside Press, Cambridge [Mass.], OCLC 2223403, page 37:

     I can see that would be the kind of a chap that the dames would stand for everlastingly.

   • 1949, Oscar Hammerstein II (lyrics), Richard Rodgers (music), “There Is Nothing Like a Dame”, in South Pacific; published in Oscar Hammerstein II (lyrics); Oscar Hammerstein II and Joshua Logan (book); Albert Sirmay [i.e., Albert Szirmai] (vocal score editor), South Pacific. A Musical Play. [...] Adapted from James A. Michener’s [...] Tales of the South Pacific [...], New York, N.Y.: Williamson Music; Milwaukee, Wis.: Hal Leonard, 1949, OCLC 497235024, page 30:

     There is nothin' like a dame / Nothin' in the world. / There is nothin' you can name / That is anythin' like a dame.

5. (archaic) A lady, a woman.

Synonyms

• See Thesaurus:woman

Derived terms

• dame school
• damehood
• damely

Related terms

• grande dame

Translations

title equivalent to Sir for a female knight

• Finnish: daami (fi)
• Maori: kahurangi
• Portuguese: dama (pt) f

• Romanian: doamnă (ro) f
• Russian: ле́ди (ru) f (lédi), дейм f (dɛjm), да́ма (ru) f (dáma)
• Serbo-Croatian: dama (sh)

(US, dated, informal, slightly derogatory) a woman

• Finnish: daami (fi)

• Russian: да́мочка (ru) f (dámočka), бабёнка (ru) f (babjónka) (derogatory), ба́ба (ru) f (bába) (derogatory), тётка (ru) f (tjótka)

(archaic) lady, woman

• Portuguese: dama (pt) f
• Russian: да́ма (ru) f (dáma), госпожа́ (ru) f (gospožá), суда́рыня (ru) f (sudárynja)

• Scottish Gaelic: baintighearna (gd) f
• Serbo-Croatian: dama (sh) f, gospa (sh)

See also

• knight
• madam
• madame
• sir

Further reading

• dame (title) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• dame (disambiguation) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• ADME, Edam, MEDA, Mead, made, mead

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Danish

Etymology

Borrowed from French dame (“lady”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /daːmə/, [ˈd̥æːmə], [ˈd̥æːm̩]

Noun

dame c (singular definite damen, plural indefinite damer)

1. lady
2. woman
3. (informal) girlfriend
4. (card games) queen

Inflection

Declension of dame

common gender	Singular		Plural
	indefinite	definite	indefinite	definite
nominative	dame	damen	damer	damerne
genitive	dames	damens	damers	damernes

Derived terms

• damet ("ladyish", "ladylike")

See also

Playing cards in Danish · kort, spillekort (layout · text)
es	toer	treer	firer	femmer	sekser	syver
otter	nier	tier	knægt, bonde	dame, dronning	konge	joker

• dame on the Danish Wikipedia.Wikipedia ^da
• Dame (kort) on the Danish Wikipedia.Wikipedia ^da

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Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from Old French dame, from Latin domina.

Pronunciation

• Audio

  (file)

• Hyphenation: da‧me

Noun

dame f (plural dames, diminutive dametje n)

1. lady
2. (chess) queen

Anagrams

• adem, made

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French

Etymology

From Old French dame, from Late Latin domna, shortened variant of Latin domina.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /dam/

• audio

  (file)

Noun

dame f (plural dames)

1. A lady
2. A polite form of address for a woman.
3. (chess) queen
4. (card games) queen

Derived terms

• dame d'attendre
• dame d'honneur
• grande dame
• jeu de dames

Further reading

• “dame” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

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Italian

Noun

dame f

1. plural of dama

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Japanese

Romanization

dame

1. Rōmaji transcription of だめ

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Norwegian Bokmål

Etymology

From Latin domina, via Old French dame and late Old Norse damma.

Noun

dame f, m (definite singular dama or damen, indefinite plural damer, definite plural damene)

1. a lady, woman
2. (card games) a queen

Derived terms

• dametoalett
• dameundertøy
• hoffdame
• kassadame

References

• “dame” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

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Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

From Latin domina, via Old French dame and late Old Norse damma.

Noun

dame f (definite singular dama, indefinite plural damer, definite plural damene)

1. a lady, woman
2. (card games) a queen

Derived terms

• dametoalett
• dameundertøy
• hoffdame
• kassadame

References

• “dame” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

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Old French

Etymology

From Late Latin domna, shortened variant of Latin domina.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈdã.mə/
• Rhymes: -amə

Noun

dame f (oblique plural dames, nominative singular dame, nominative plural dames)

1. lady; woman

Usage notes

• Unlike in modern French, fame usually refers to a wife, while dame refers to a woman.

Descendants

• English: dame
• French: dame

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Spanish

Verb

dame

1. Compound of the informal second-person singular (tú) affirmative imperative form of dar, da and the pronoun me: give me!