headmistress

[hed-mis-tris]

noun

1. a woman in charge of a private school.

headmistress

/ ˌhɛdˈmistrəs /

noun

1. Gender-neutral form: head teacher. a female principal of a school

Gender Note

See -ess.

Other Word Forms

• headmistress-ship noun
• headmistressship noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of headmistress¹

First recorded in 1870–75; head + mistress

Example Sentences

"Over the years, we had lower and lower people who decided to come to this school," the headmistress says, in English, hinting at tensions.

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Horace Zwender, there is no dearth of likely suspects: He has wronged everyone from his college girlfriend to the academy’s headmistress; he has abused girls at multiple schools.

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Neither the stage production nor the musical can do much with the melodramatic Madame Morrible, the headmistress at Shiz who becomes a key player in the Wonderful Wizard of Oz’s fascist machinations.

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Her headmistress was angry, complaining that her former pupil was throwing her life away.

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“Miss Trunchbull is the evil headmistress. They only exist in a children’s book.”

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