STEPMOTHER

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does stepmother mean? 

• STEPMOTHER (noun)
  The noun STEPMOTHER has 1 sense:

1. the wife of your father by a subsequent marriage

  Familiarity information: STEPMOTHER used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• STEPMOTHER (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The wife of your father by a subsequent marriage

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Hypernyms ("stepmother" is a kind of...):

stepparent (the spouse of your parent by a subsequent marriage)

 Context examples 

When he came out, she said to him: Listen, dearest Roland, we must fly in all haste; my stepmother wanted to kill me, but has struck her own child.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

Mr. Rucastle told me in private that the reason why she had left them was that she had an unreasoning aversion to her stepmother.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Her stepmother sent her out every day to sit by the well in the high road, there to spin until she made her fingers bleed.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

The two children had also not been able to sleep for hunger, and had heard what their stepmother had said to their father.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

She ran home crying to tell of her misfortune, but her stepmother spoke harshly to her, and after giving her a violent scolding, said unkindly, As you have let the spindle fall into the well you may go yourself and fetch it out.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)