stepdame
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of stepdame
Middle English word dating back to 1350–1400; see origin at step-, dame
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.
Two cases will th’ affair explain— The good Hippolytus was slain; In that his stepdame credit found, And Troy was levell’d with the ground; Because Cassandra’s prescious care Sought, but obtain’d no credence there.
From The Fables of Phædrus Literally translated into English prose with notes by Riley, Henry T. (Henry Thomas)
Beautiful, brilliant, and ambitious, the young and restless Armine quitted, in his eighteenth year, the house of his fathers, and his stepdame of a country, and entered the Imperial service.
From Henrietta Temple A Love Story by Disraeli, Benjamin, Earl of Beaconsfield
Ye cruell starres, and eke ye gods unkinde, Heaven envious, and bitter stepdame Nature!
From The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 5 by Spenser, Edmund
The poor child is to have a stepdame so soon as the year of mourning is passed.
From Grisly Grisell by Yonge, Charlotte Mary
Anybody would have guessed Miss to have been bred up under the influence of a cruel stepdame, and John to be the fondling of a tender mother.
From History of John Bull by Arbuthnot, John
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.
