'Mrs Pleasant, a handsome young Gentlewoman of a good fortune' in The Parson's Wedding (1641) by Thomas Killigrew.'Quartilla, gentlewoman to Triphoena', in Holland's Leaguer (1631) by Shackerley Marmion.A Yorkshire Gentlewoman and Her Son by George Chapman (17th century).'Helena, a Gentlewoman', in All's Well That Ends Well.Richard Braithwaite's The English Gentlewoman (1631), followed his The English Gentleman (1630), both being books about acceptable behaviour.Written by Jane Anger, Gentlewoman at London (1589) Jane Anger: Her Protection for Women to defend them against the scandalous reports of a late surfeiting Lover.

1567 earliest known volume of English language secular poetry published by a woman

Isabella Whitney, The Copy of a Letter, Lately Written in Meter by a Young Gentlewoman: to her Unconstant Lover, ca.

Enitan Bereola II, Gentlewoman: Etiquette for a Lady, from a Gentleman (2014).

'Gentlewoman' also has a local usage in the United States House of Representatives, referring to a female member of the House, as in 'the gentlewoman from '. įrom the time of Queen Mary I and Queen Elizabeth I, the title Gentlewoman of Her Majesty's Bedchamber was borne by ladies serving the Queen of England, later becoming Lady of the Bedchamber.

A woman with good manners and high standards of behaviour.

This might be a court appointment as the female equivalent to a valet de chambre. A woman attending a great lady (as, for example, the character in William Shakespeare's Macbeth called only 'Gentlewoman', who attends Lady Macbeth).A woman of gentle birth or high social position.The closely related English word ' gentry' derives from the Old French genterise, gentelise, with much of the meaning of the French noblesse and the German Adel, but without the strict technical requirements of those traditions, such as quarters of nobility.īy association with gentleman, the word can refer to: A gentlewoman (from the Latin gentilis, belonging to a gens, and English 'woman') in the original and strict sense is a woman of good family, analogous to the Latin generosus and generosa.

The gentlewoman magazine subscription