laundress

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Noun

laundress (plural laundresses)

1. A woman whose employment is laundering.

Translations

• French: blanchisseuse, lavandière
• German: Waschfrau
• Portuguese: lavadeira
• Russian: пра́чка
• Spanish: lavandera

Verb

laundress (laundresses, present participle laundressing; past and past participle laundressed)

1. (obsolete, historical) To act as a laundress.
   • 1850, Charles Dickens, David Copperfield, Chapter 26,

     ‘Sir,’ said Mrs. Crupp, in a tone approaching to severity, ‘I’ve laundressed other young gentlemen besides yourself. […] ’

   • 1875, Mary Louisa Molesworth, “Too Bad” in Tell Me a Story, London: Macmillan, 5th edition, 1882, p. 169,

     And oh, my dears, real washing is very different work from the dolls’ laundressing—standing round a wash-hand basin placed on a nursery chair, and wasting ever so much beautiful honey-soap in nice clean hot water […]

   • 2007, Lawrence Hill, The Book of Negroes (Someone Knows My Name), New York: Norton, Book Three, p. 260,

     Mama got herself free before she had me, and she was laundressing for the British since my early days.

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