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spinster

spinster

21 8.6
An older woman who never married, often described in an old-fashioned or unkind way
  • noun
  • /ˈspɪn.stɚ/
  • Slur
: solterona
  • In 1890, she was a spinster who had just seen her fortieth birthday.
  • widows and spinsters

And we find this old bachelor and his kind of spinster sister.

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Examples

  • As the town spinster, I had no picture of my old age.

    Fiction book (2000)
  • We can grow old and become spinsters together.

  • She'd be a spinster for the rest of her life.

  • Who would harm a kindly old spinster like me?

  • You can't spend the rest of your life as a spinster, after all.

    Fiction book (1999)
  • I'm the town spinster, and I've gotten two wedding proposals in the past six months.

    Fiction book (2000)
  • Amelia was a wealthy spinster, allied with a New York City police inspector.

    Fiction book (2001)
  • Although a "stately" spinster, Amelia was one by choice, having rejected two suitors.

    Fiction book (2001)
  • She's a lonely spinster.

  • In her small town, she was often viewed as an old spinster who never married.

Synonyms

old maid
vsspinster
  • Slur
16 8.9

An older woman who has never married, often used as an insult

has the same sense but is a different word form
unmarried woman
vsspinster
11 1.0

A woman who is not married

adds older implication and an old-fashioned disapproving tone

Antonyms

∞ 1.0

A married woman who is someone's partner

Surface Forms

spinster singular
spinsters plural

Morphology

spinster = spin (opaque) = spin + ster

Although historically formed from 'spin' + the agentive suffix '-ster' meaning 'woman who spins', the modern sense 'unmarried woman' is a later sense shift and is not derivable from the components by a typical B1 learner.

Etymology

The word spinster comes from the old job word spin meaning 'to twist thread' plus the ending -ster meaning 'a person who does something'. A spinster was first a woman who spun thread, and over time the word came to mean an unmarried woman, often one older than the usual marrying age.