strumpet

American  

[struhm-pit] / ˈstrʌm pɪt /

noun

Older Use.

1. a prostitute.

2. a sexually promiscuous woman (now often used facetiously).

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strumpet British  

/ ˈstrʌmpɪt /

noun

1. archaic a prostitute or promiscuous woman

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Other Word Forms

• strumpetlike adjective

Etymology

Origin of strumpet

First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English; origin uncertain

Example Sentences

O’Farrell said Hathaway has been portrayed as “an illiterate strumpet” because she was uneducated and eight years older than Shakespeare.

From Seattle Times

Nudge one wing ever so gently aside with a fingertip, though, and you’ll reveal hindwings patterned like colorful petticoats — often striped in brown and gold, reddish or orange, a peekaboo costume befitting the brashest strumpet.

From New York Times

Neither the phrase ‘a strumpet’s fool,’ nor the assertion ‘the nobleness of life is to do thus,’ answers to the total effect of the play.

From Project Gutenberg

Few men dared to tread among Newgate’s “notorious strumpets,” but the fearless Fry reached out to Ludlow and thousands of others as one mother to another, asking with simple eloquence: “What doest thou need?”

From New York Times

How like a prodigal doth she return, With over-weather'd ribs and ragged sails, Lean, rent, and beggared by the strumpet wind!

From Project Gutenberg