gladiatress

English

Etymology

From gladiator +‎ -ess.

Noun

gladiatress (plural gladiatresses)

1. A female gladiator.
   • 1660, Robert Stapylton, Mores Hominum. The Manners of Men, Described in Sixteen Satyrs by Juvenal: […], London: […] R. Hodgkinsonne:

     What did ſhe ſee to doat upon the ſtile / Of Gladiatreſs? […] Mævia (a Gladiatreſs) fights with a wilde Boar, 21

   • 1786, Edward Owen, A Translation of Juvenal and Persius into English Verse. […], 2nd edition, London: […] Rivington and Sons; J. Johnson, […]; W. Lowndes, […], and J. Debrett, […], page 49:

     Oh! nobly train’d and tutor’d by this art / To take at Flora’s ſhows the harlot’s part, / Unleſs it be her purpoſe to engage / As real gladiatreſs on the ſtage!

   • 1834 January 22, The Boston Morning Post, volume V, number 111, Boston, Mass.: […] Charles Gordon Greene, page [2], column 3:

     Amidst all the contests of the day, we learn nothing of that illustrious gladiatress, Mrs Anne Royal.

   • 1842 December 1, The Art-Union. A Monthly Journal of Fine Arts., volume IV, number 47, London: […] J. How, […], page 275, column 3:

     From the disgusting to the ridiculous there is but one step, as exemplified in Rome by the combats of dwarfs, which diverted the people exceedingly, especially when any one of them engaged with a gladiatress.

   • 1860, “The French Almanacks for 1861”, in Bentley’s Miscellany, volume XLVIII, London: Richard Bentley, […], pages 466–467:

     M. Papillon—The combat is superb! It inflames me! Madame Papillon, will you have a bout with me? Madame Papillon—You are mad. Do you think I am a gladiatress?

   • 1869 June 22, “General News”, in The Weekly Sentinel, volume 4, number 22, Raleigh, N.C., page [4], column 5:

     Two females in Vincenne, Ind., some days ago, arranged for a prize fight. A ring was formed by the sporting men, and gladiatresses stripped to the combat when the police broke in and arrested them.

   • 1896 December 4, “December, Chill December”, in Linn County Republic, volume XIII, number 35, Mound City, Kan., front page, column 6:

     This was an occasion when the gladiators and gladiatresses of Rome turned themselves loose and painted the town a carmine hue.

   • 1900, Weird Women: Being a Literal Translation of “Les Diaboliques,” of Barbey d’Aurévilly, first volume, London, Paris: Lutetian Bibliophiles’ Society: […], page 300:

     In following this woman he had but obeyed an irresistible curiosity, and a vulgar whim, but when she who had inspired these feelings came out of her dressing-room, where she had taken off her habiliments, and came towards him in the costume, which was not one, of a gladiatress about to fight, he was literally thunderstruck by a beauty which his experienced eye—the sculptor’s eye of the real lover of woman—had not entirely divined on the Boulevard, in spite of the whispered revelations of the dress and the walk.

   • 1902 July 2, “The Casual Club”, in The Onlooker, volume II, number 2, New York, N.Y.: The Observer Publishing Company, […], page 6:

     I should want none of it; still less, were I about my wife hunting, would I yearn for union and a domestic existence with one of those gladiatresses—to coin a word—who under Lycurgus made up the Spartan female population.

   • 1932 July 14, Henry McLemore, “Poland Outbids U.S. For Sprinter: Stella Walsh Will Run For Her Homeland”, in The Bend Bulletin, volume XXX, number 33, Bend, Ore., page two, column 2:

     As soon as the noble gladiators and gladiatresses have finished repeating their song and dance about “for this and that and the glory of sport,” Miss Walsh will be led to the center of the stadium, placed on a platform composed entirely of staple groceries, and handed a full dinner pail.

   • 1937 May 17, W. A. Whitcomb, “Rosamond Vahey Appears Best in State Golf Field”, in Boston Evening Globe, volume CXXXI, number 137, Boston, Mass., page 22, column 6:

     And conspicuous among the late round gladiatresses, and I hope you don’t stutter, will be the always reliable and temperamentally consistent Rosamond Vahey of Vesper, who has twice won already and will be out among the fen-bordered pines of the Clyde trying to make it three.

   • 1943 June 6, “Putter-Mutterings: On the Salem Golfers”, in The Oregon Statesman, ninety third year, number 61, Salem, Ore., page twelve:

     All is in readiness for the “Big Day” today on the Salem golf course, and before it’s over some 75 to 100 greensward gladiators and gladiatresses are expected to take part in the festivities.

   • 1949 August 28, Roy Thompson, “Rassler Says ‘a Woman Should Know How to Protect Herself’”, in Winston-Salem Journal, 46th year, number 35, Winston-Salem, N.C., page 4B, column 5:

     Ellen was tossed about the ring for some 20 minutes, but justice triumphed in the end and June was thrown on hers. As the gladiatresses slipped back through the whistling and jeering throng, this reporter followed, eager to learn something about how a lady rassler decides to become a lady rassler.

   • 1976 February 15, “Y-Hagua The Silly Season Is Here”, in The Sunday News, volume 7, number 14, Agana, Guam, page 19:

     The weaker sex is expected to field about 105 hopefuls while women will send about 25 gladiatresses into battle.

   • 1978 June 4, Gary Johansen, “Her Job Started as a Fluke”, in Sunday World-Herald Magazine of the Midlands, Omaha, Neb., page 22:

     So LaDonna Anderson picked up the trainer’s satchel (gad, it was heavy) and went out to attend wounded gladiators and gladiatresses (in season).

   • 1991 May 1, Congressional Record: Proceedings and Debates of the 102^d Congress, First Session, volumes 137—part 7, Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, page 9756, column 1:

     The world of “Cementville,” for instance, is that of third-rate arenas and the desperation pseudosport of wrestling, female division. However seamy these gladiatresses, they are held in awe by the fans.

   • 1993 July 26, Gil LeBreton, “Paschal basketball coach faces Olympic dilemma”, in Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Fort Worth, Tex., section C, page 9:

     Her dreams supposedly didn’t include American Gladiators, either. Yet Langston, despite being only 5-8 and 145 pounds, survived the show’s brawny gladiatresses to reach the semifinals.

   • 2007 September, Steve Kandell, “Rocklahoma”, in Spin, New York, N.Y., page 88, column 3:

     After Twisted Sister’s Sunday night set, Rocklahoma closes, as all good music festivals should, with an oil wrestling competition. Most Rocklahomans have fled until next year—tickets are already available. Adam and John wind up drinking with Dirty Penny, helping to lube up the gladiatresses.

   • 2017, Peter Ackroyd, Queer City: Gay London from the Romans to the Present Day, London: Chatto & Windus, →ISBN, page 12:

     Petronius writes of a female essedaria, a gladiatress, fighting from a British chariot.

Synonyms

• gladiatrix

Translations

female gladiator — see gladiatrix