old lady

American  

noun

Informal.

• old ladies
  plural

1. a mother, usually one's own.

2. a wife.

3. a girlfriend or female lover, especially a female lover with whom one cohabits.

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old lady British  

noun

1. an informal term for mother 1 wife

2. a large noctuid moth, Mormo maura, that has drab patterned wings originally thought to resemble an elderly Victorian lady's shawl

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• old ladies
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of old lady

First recorded in 1775–85

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

old lady

Opposed to their memorialist passion are people like Nili Bar Sinai, 76, a tough old lady from Be’eri, a much larger kibbutz 12 miles northeast of Nir Oz.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 6, 2026

"One old lady pays me with a pint mug of tea and two slices of toast".

From BBC ● Mar. 16, 2026

Read on: Want to be a rich old lady?

From MarketWatch ● Jan. 16, 2026

To this, Oliver sarcastically replies, “No one needs your 17th-century old lady food and outdated social rules.”

From Salon ● Nov. 1, 2025

Could it be true that nobody saw Finn except the old lady?

From "The Strangers" by Margaret Peterson Haddix

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Related Words

• bride
• lover
• spouse
• wife

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