aldermaness

noun

al·​der·​man·​ess ˈȯl-dər-mə-nəs 

plural aldermanesses

: the wife of an alderman

It is easy to dismiss the role of lady mayoress or aldermaness as peripheral and incidental to the distribution of power and influence within urban society …

—Rosemary Sweet, Women and Urban Life in Eighteenth-Century England, 2003

Word History

First Known Use

1838, in the meaning defined above

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