queen
Meanings
- The wife, consort, or widow of a king.
- A female monarch.
- A woman whose pre-eminence, power, or forcefulness is comparable to that of a queen.
- The Virgin Mary (especially in formulations such as Queen of Heaven, Queen of Glory).
- An excellent woman.
- A woman pre-eminent in a particular group or field.
- An attractive woman; a female partner in a romantic relationship.
- A girl or woman chosen to preside in an honorary or ceremonial manner over a specified festivity or occasion, as May Queen, Homecoming Queen, prom queen, pearly queen.
- Something regarded as the greatest of its kind or as having pre-eminence or power comparable to that of a queen over a given area.
- Referring to one of several items used in tabletop games:
- A chess piece that, under contemporary rules, is the most powerful, able to move any number of spaces horizontally, vertically, or diagonally.
- A playing card with a depiction of a queen on it, generally ranking next below the king and above the jack in a given suit.
- To act the part of a queen; to behave imperiously; to queen it.
- To make a queen or (figuratively) to give the status of a queen.
- To promote a pawn to a queen.
- To be the queen bee of a colony.
- To provide with a new queen bee.
- To sit on a person’s face to receive oral sex, typically while straddling the person’s head.
- Alternative letter-case form of queen (“consort or widow of a king”).
- Alternative letter-case form of queen (“female monarch”).
- A title used before the personal name of a queen.
- radiotelephony clear-code word for the letter Q.
- Alternative letter-case form of queen (“Virgin Mary”).
- In Commonwealth realms, the personification of the Crown, particularly in legal matters.
- A surname transferred from the nickname, originating as a nickname.
- An unincorporated community in Eddy County, New Mexico, United States, named after the Queen Ranch.
- An unincorporated community in Bedford County, Pennsylvania, United States.
Pronunciation
Word forms
Etymology
From Middle English quene, queen, cwen, from Old English cwēn (“queen”), from Proto-West Germanic *kwāni, from Proto-Germanic *kwēniz (“wife, woman”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʷénh₂s (“woman”). Cognate with Scots queen, wheen (“queen”), Old Saxon quān ("wife"; > Middle Low German quene (“elderly woman”)), Dutch kween (“woman past child-bearing age”), Swedish kvinna (“woman”), Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk kvinne (“woman”), Danish kvinde (“woman”), Icelandic kvon (“wife”), Gothic 𐌵𐌴𐌽𐍃 (qēns, “wife”), Norwegian dialectal kvån (“wife”). Related to and possibly merged with and/or absorbed some senses of English quean, from Middle English quene, from Old English cwene (“woman; female serf, quean”), see quean. Generally eclipsed non-native Middle English regina (“queen”), borrowed from Latin rēgīna (“queen”) (see Modern English Regina). Doublet of quean and gyne. In reference to insects, by analogy with the obsolete term king, which it took over from starting in the 1600s, when they were discovered to be female.