lady of the evening
1
9.2
- noun
- NSFW
:
mujer de la noche
Examples
-
A lady of the evening.
-
"A lady of the evening, actually," Grant said dryly.
Fiction book (1999) -
I've had lunch with a police officer, a monk, and a "lady of the evening" all at the same table.
Blog text (12) -
The film portrayed a group of women working as ladies of the evening in the 1920s.
-
During the investigation, the police interviewed several ladies of the evening to gather more information.
-
He discreetly offered a bouquet to the lady of the evening he had just met.
Synonyms
478
9.3
An offensive word for a person who has sex for money
342
4.2
A person who has sex with other people for money
314
9.0
A person who sells sex for money, often on the street
23
7.9
A woman who is paid to have sex and who arranges meetings by phone or online
13
9.9
A woman who has sex with rich or powerful men for money, often in high society in the past
2
8.6
A woman who sells sex for money
1
8.9
A woman who offers sex for money by standing in the street
1
9.9
A woman who has sex for money, used in older books
A woman who works as a prostitute
A person who has sex for money
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase combines 'lady' (woman) with 'evening' to create a euphemistic image of a woman associated with nighttime activity, so learners can partially infer a non-literal, social meaning. However, the specific sense 'prostitute' is culturally coded and metaphorical rather than strictly compositional, so knowing the words alone is unlikely to guarantee full understanding without exposure to the euphemism.
Etymology
Lady of the evening may come from a polite way people used to talk about women who worked at night. People used lady to sound respectful and evening to show she worked 'at night', so the phrase became a softer name for a 'prostitute'.