duenna
Americannoun
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(in Spain and Portugal) an older woman serving as escort or chaperon of a young lady.
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a governess.
noun
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of duenna
First recorded in 1660–70; from older Spanish duenna (modern Spanish dueña ), from Latin domina, feminine of dominus “lord, master”
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Georgian discipline . . . a sketch of Sheridan’s duenna, or chaperone The early life of 18th-century playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan sounds like the stuff of .
From The Guardian • Sep. 29, 2010
The show had all the virtues of the duenna -care, good taste, restraint and fondness for her charges -but also the one vice: it was often pretty dull.
From Time Magazine Archive
Said one 128 president: "We don't let our chief scientist out of town without a duenna."
From Time Magazine Archive
At least once, however, the duenna grew forgetful, and Melville briefly became a poet.
From Time Magazine Archive
Her mother-in-law, who, like many mothers-in-law in Persia, fills the post of duenna to the establishment, frightened me by the expression of her handsome face and her sneering, fiendish laugh.
From Journeys in Persia and Kurdistan, Volume II (of 2) Including a Summer in the Upper Karun Region and a Visit to the Nestorian Rayahs by Bird, Isabella L. (Isabella Lucy)
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
