helpmate

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I'll be his helpmate, and he shall not know it.

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Definitions (5)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (2)

  1. noun A helper and companion, especially a spouse.
  2. Word History
    The existence of the synonyms helpmeet and helpmate is the result of an error compounded. God's promise to Adam in Genesis 2:18, as rendered in the King James version of the Bible (1611), was to give him "an help [helper] meet [fit or suitable] for him.” The poet John Dryden's 1673 use of the phrase "help-meet for man,” with a hyphen between help and meet, was one step on the way toward the establishment of the phrase "help meet” as an independent word. Another was the use of "help meet” without "for man” to mean a suitable helper, usually a spouse, as Eve had been to Adam. Despite such usages, helpmeet was not usually thought of as a word in its own right until the 19th century. Nonetheless, the phrase "help meet” probably played a role in the creation of helpmate, from help and mate, first recorded in 1715.

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Examples (50)

  • The favourites with the writer are a brave old soldier and his helpmate, an ancient gentlewoman who sold apples, and a strange kind of wandering man and his wife. —  Lavengro
  • It was recovered for me by my good and valued helpmate--I mean, by a young lady, who, even if I do say so, is an accomplished actress You ain't lost your carnival grifter ways! —  062 - The Pirate's Ghost
  • He was a scruffy excuse for a helpmate, which Anna guessed he was by the vest he wore. —  one
  • In all this his wife is his helpmate, his mother his inspiration.--What more can I say Nothing," said Henry Van Ostend gravely. —  Flamsted quarries
  • The favourites with the writer are a brave old soldier and his helpmate, an ancient gentlewoman who sold apples, and a strange kind of wandering man and his wife Amongst the many things attempted in this book is the encouragement of charity, and free and genial manners, and the exposure of humbug, of which there are various kinds, but of which the most perfidious, the most debasing, and the most cruel, is the humbug of the Priest Yet let no one think that irreligion is advocated in this book. —  Lavengro The Scholar, the Gypsy, the Priest
 

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This word has been looked up 89 times.

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Etymologies (2)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Probably alteration of helpmeet (influenced by mate1).

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. from help + mate; cf. helpfellow, an equivalent compound of much older date. Cf. helpmeet.
 

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/ˈhɛlpmeɪt/
by American Heritage

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