Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A woman who sells oysters.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Hector (as the ballads of those times mention), they were pretty smart fellows; they fought at sword and buckler; but the former had much the better of it; his mother, who was an oyster-woman, having got a blacksmith of Lemnos to make her son's weapons.

    The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 George A. Aitken

  • Only the other day I learned for the first time that my father was a greengrocer, who went in for selling coals by the half-hundred and thereby made his fortune -- my mother was an unsuccessful oyster-woman who failed ignominiously at Margate -- moreover,

    Thelma Marie Corelli 1889

  • Therefore we straggled in a long crowd to Moorgate -- man and maid, noble and 'prentice, alderman and oyster-woman, jesting and scolding as we jostled one another in the narrow way, and rejoicing when at length we broke free into the pleasant meadows and smelt the sweetness of the early hay.

    Sir Ludar A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess Talbot Baines Reed 1872

  • The oyster-woman having died, the young negress became a servant at the Colonial tavern.

    The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. Guy de Maupassant 1871

  • REMONENCQ (Madame), born in 1796, at one time a beautiful oyster-woman of the "Cadran Bleu" in Paris; married for love the porter-tailor,

    Repertory of the Comedie Humaine Part 2 Anatole Cerfberr 1865

  • Pitch into them with your broom! call the oyster-woman and the potboy next door to help you.

    Mysteries of Paris — Volume 02 Eug��ne Sue 1830

  • Macheath, and the well-known Bab Selby, the oyster-woman, and Fig, the boxer, and old Corins, the clerical attorney.

    The English Spy An Original Work Characteristic, Satirical, And Humorous. Comprising Scenes And Sketches In Every Rank Of Society, Being Portraits Drawn From The Life Robert Cruikshank 1828

  • And secondly, the doctor lies under an obligation to this horrid oyster-woman; she called him in to attend M. Pillerault.

    Cousin Pons Honor�� de Balzac 1824

  • “Oh! I suppose, when you heard of this offer, you did not take leisure enough to come downstairs, but leaped out of the window: did you overturn no porter nor oyster-woman in your way?

    The Adventures of Roderick Random 2004

  • "Oh! I suppose, when you heard of this offer, you did not take leisure enough to come downstairs, but leaped out of the window: did you overturn no porter nor oyster-woman in your way?

    The Adventures of Roderick Random Tobias George Smollett 1746

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