whore

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“
He contended that anyone who had the misfortune to be a woman must have the courage to be a whore, that the whore is the essential woman, and that relations with women, incidentally, are more or less degrading.

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Definitions (18)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (7)

  1. noun A prostitute.
  2. noun A person considered sexually promiscuous.
  3. noun A person considered as having compromised principles for personal gain.
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Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (3)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (4)

Toggle WordNet definitions WordNet (4)

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Examples (50)

  • He makes nice with some slutty clerk he knows, buys condoms, she basically calls him a man-whore, advising that it's cheaper to just buy those things in bulk, but as she's kindly giving him a free children's book, she notices a giant explosion about a half-mile away. —  Television Without Pity
  • He will inveigle you to naughtiness to get your good name into his clutches; he will be your pandar to have you on the hip for a whore-master, and make you drunk to shew you reeling. —  Microcosmography or, a Piece of the World Discovered; in Essays and Characters
  • He turned to Friar Mathieu and jerked his head at de Verceuil Tell him When Friar Mathieu had repeated John's command, the cardinal answered, "Tell Messer John that we have reason to believe that this Jewish whore is an agent of Manfred von Hohenstaufen, the enemy we are marching to destroy. —  The Saracen: The Holy War
  • 266 The woman's a whore, and there's an end on't,' ii. —  Life of Johnson, Volume 6 Addenda, index, dicta philosophi, etc.
  • And it came to pass that after three months, one told Iuda saying: Thamar thy daughter-in-law hath played the whore, and with playing the whore is become great with child. —  The first New Testament printed in English
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Related

Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

prostitute ·  slut ·  bitch ·  thief ·  beggar ·  liar ·  hooker ·  scoundrel ·  wench ·  gambler ·  dancer ·  robber

Used in the same contextWord Family

whore:   whores
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (3)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English hore, from Old English hōre; see kā- in Indo-European roots.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (2)

  1. With unorig. w, as in whole, etc.; from Middle English hore, a harlot (not in Anglo-Saxon), from Icelandic hōra, adulteress, = Swedish hora = Danish hore = Dutch hoer = Old High German huora, huorra, Middle High German huore, German hure (Goth, hōr, feminine, not found, another word, kalki, being used); also in masculine form, Icelandic hōrr = Goth, hōrs, adulterer; cf. Anglo-Saxon *hōr, adultery (in comp. hōrcwēn, adulteress), from Icelandic hōr = Swedish Danish hor = Old High German huor, adultery; cf. Middle High German herge, feminine, a prostitute; Old Bulgarian kurŭva = Polish kurwa = Lithuanian kurva, adulteress (perhaps from Teutonic). Some compare Irish caraim, love, cara, friend, Latin cārus, dear, orig. loving (see caress), Sanskrit chāru, agreeable, beautiful, etc. The word was confused or homiletieally associated in early Middle English with Middle English hore, from Anglo-Saxon horu(horw-) = Old Saxon horu, horo = OFries. hore = Old High German horo, filth, dirt. By some modern writers it has been erroneously derived from hire, as if ‘one hired,’ the notion really present in the equivalent L. meretrix, a prostitute (see meretrix).The vowel in this word was orig. long, and the reg. modern form would be *hoor (hör), the pron. hōr instead of hör (as given by Walker beside hōr) is prob. due to the confusion with the Middle English hore, filth, and to the later confusion of the initial ho- with who-, as also in whole. The word, with its derivatives, is now avoided in polite speech; its survival in literature, so far as it survives, is due to the fact that it is a favorite word with Shakspere (who uses it, with its derivatives, 99 times) and is common in the authorized English version of the Bible. The word in all its forms (whoredom, etc.) is generally retained in the revised version of the Old Testament, though the American revisers recommended the substitution of harlot, as less gross; in the revised version of the New Testament harlot (with fornicator for whoremonger, etc.) is substituted.
  2. = German huren = Swedish hora = Danish hore; cf. Dutch hoereren; from the noun.
 

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/hoʊr/
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