Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The mistress of a castle.
- n. The mistress of a large, fashionable household.
- n. A clasp or chain worn at the waist for holding keys, a purse, or a watch.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A female castellan; the lady of the castle or château. See chatelain.
- n. A chain, or group of chains, worn by castellans, by which the keys of a castle were suspended from the girdle; hence, a similar modern device for suspending watch-keys, seals, trinkets, etc.; and so, by extension, the trinkets themselves.
- Pertaining to or of the nature of a chatelaine: as, a chatelaine watch.
Wiktionary
- n. The mistress of a castle or large household.
- n. A chain or clasp worn at the waist by women, with handkerchief, keys, etc., attached (supposed to resemble the chain of keys once worn by mediaeval chatelaines).
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. An ornamental hook, or brooch worn by a lady at her waist, and having a short chain or chains attached for a watch, keys, trinkets, etc. Also used adjectively.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a chain formerly worn at the waist by women; for carrying a purse or bunch of keys etc.
- n. the mistress of a chateau or large country house
Etymologies
- From French châtelaine. (Wiktionary)
- French châtelaine, feminine of châtelain, chatelain, from Old French chastelain; see chatelain. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“He’d spent a good hour looking up the word chatelaine in the dictionary.”
“Carega, newly appointed chatelaine of Castle Vitre, had watched her through the Thenglass.”
“It was no wonder the chatelaine had instructed the child to withhold the flask save the three times.”
“Elizabeth, retired into domestic bliss as a mother and the chatelaine of Pemberley, has lost that crucial wit and spark -- that feistiness and sense of self -- that Austen gave her and which made us love her.”
“The lovers' sojourn in Matthew's ancestral chateau is well-done, and some of the supporting characters are marvelous, notably Matthew's mother, a vampire chatelaine.”
The Washington Post: Books: 'A Discovery of Witches' by Deborah Harkness, reviewed by Elizabeth Hand
“The cats woke us promptly at 6. * wince* Had an exciting morning of bill-paying and other chatelaine work and more Wiscon organization, then off to Star Trek!”
“Lady Agnes Holland, the new chatelaine of Eaton Place, sweeps through her life assuming that other people – aka the lower orders – are there entirely for her convenience.”
The Guardian: Upstairs, Downstairs and servant porn | Kathryn Hughes
“La Musarderie had a new chatelaine in place of its castellan.”
“There was a red Morocco leather box on the table, and when she opened it, she found a lady's chatelaine watch within, complete with neckchain.”
“It is half a melancholy ruin, where the present chatelaine, Lady Egremont, has created an enchanting garden, and half a Georgian house, full of treasures.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘chatelaine’.
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phrontistery - c
from phrontistery.info
czardas, cytometer, cytology, cytheromania, cystoscope, cystolith, cyrenaic, cypseline, cyprinoid, cyphonism, cynophobia, cytogenesis and 1298 more...
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Hence
Words with definitions that have a "hence" in them.
hanger, Deet, tripe, spindlelegs, fiddle, store, pluck, snap, villain, link, comedy, particular and 410 more...
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First I Look at the Purse
purse, Purse, purses, pursed, First I Look at t..., purse money, purse-crew, purse-gang, purser, pursers, coin purse, purse-seine and 39 more...
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Charles Michael Kittridge Thompson IV
Words from the songs of Frank Black, a.k.a. Black Francis
zugzwang, valhalla, montalvo, ishist, tritons, mosh, siam, llano del rio, protohuman, tumbleweeds, ludwigshafen, ballyhoos and 349 more...
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Chennessy's Words
philistine, messianic, dyad, cult, bourgeois, blot, ploy, polyglot, lingua franca, cumbersome, lumber, petit-bourgeois and 446 more...
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(more or less) Temporary Urth List
Temporary list is temporary.
Collecting a few words here, which are then to be alloted to other lists.vassal, gnaw, putrescence, liege, pederasty, disseminate, loot, waning, fitful, hiatuse, plow, pious and 292 more...
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colleen's words
yellow, green, pie, blue, fur, people, incense, book, brown, avuncular, mountain, fog and 1316 more...
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fbharjo's Words
jumelle, kef, kenspeckle, lautitious, essentic, pilpulistic, impavid, cicurant, clou, chrysostomic, miasma, teleology and 1625 more...
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5-0
Hecko, words! I’m so happy I’ve found you. I want to keep you all and never want to lose you again. I hope you like it here.
amscray, thistledown, tine, tinsel, pungent, snarl, wail, lanky, viscid, dawdle, luminous, stow and 2719 more...
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The Good Soldier
Words taken from The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford.
concatenation, vorticist, imagiste, auk, acquaintanceship, perforce, tapageu, jeunes, minuet, outsound, sedulous, goodheartedness and 105 more...
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Eine kleine Wörterwunderkammer
Verbal curios, because of their meaning, their shape, or their history.
phlogiston, tisane, ptisan, phthisis, fimbulwinter, zarf, mono no aware, woodwose, psychopomp, jabot, chatelaine, tappen and 82 more...
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hberman's Words
miasma, inchoate, abstemious, entropy, perseverate, inveigle, prevaricate, threnody, bloviate, pusillanimous, chatelaine, chatoyant and 9 more...
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expert
words that experts know.
cacique, erethism, o.p.a.c., performativity, telnet, bibliometrics, n.u.f.a.n., levy, copy catalog, repurpose, tattle tape, syncretic and 36 more...
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some words I like
lorem ipsum, amble, conjunctiva, ribaldry, pedestrian, floret, frith, philately, mercy, transpierced, wrist, codicil and 40 more...
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While reading
littoral, manichean, omerta, opprobrium, discomfit, betise, tittle, pellucid, chiffonier, hagiographic, essoin, raiment and 35 more...
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mcobb's Words
obfuscate, pusillanimous, raison d'etre, malediction, internecine, overwrought, anathema, obsequious, eipgraph, idiosyncratic, neologism, conundrum and 15 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for chatelaine.
reesetee Ah, yes. They played that song to death here when it first debuted. :-) Dec 5, 2007
rolig "Just a kiss, just a kiss –
I have lived for this.
I can't explain
why I've become
Miss Chatelaine." – k.d. lang
Nice Canadian reference on the part of Albertan k.d. lang: Chatelaine is the name of a Canadian women's magazine. Dec 5, 2007