temptress

Etymology

It is formed from English tempter + -ess, a female counterpart of tempter.^[2][3][4][5] Tempter goes back to Middle English temptour, from Old French tempteur or directly from Latin temptātor, an agent noun from temptō (“to feel, try out”), the source of tempt.^[3][2] The Shorter Oxford allows that the word may be formed on the same root as tempter rather than on the English noun itself.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

A woman who tempts: 1594, in Nashe's The Unfortunate Traveller.^[2][6] Etymonline and Dictionary.com date it to the 1590s, in the sense "woman who entices".^[3][5]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept the single sense of a female tempter since its first record.^[2][4] The masculine tempter was used from the 14th century above all of the devil, one who solicits to sin,^[3][2] and the modern dictionaries define temptress chiefly as a woman who sets out to allure or seduce, close to seductress.^[7][8][9]

Timeline

• 1594 – a female tempter, in Nashe.^[2][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A woman who tempts or entices; especially one who sets out to allure or seduce someone; a seductress: In the film she plays a temptress who ruins a banker.^[7][8][9][6]

Related words

• tempt
• tempter
• temptation
• attempt

Usage notes

Random House lists the word among the nouns in -ess and refers to its usage note on that suffix.^[10]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
8. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
9. ^ a b Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
10. ^ Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House