astronomeress

English

Etymology

From astronomer +‎ -ess.

Noun

astronomeress (plural astronomeresses) (rare)

A female astronomer.
- 1842, Catherine Gore, Cecil, a Peer, a Sequel to Cecil, or the Adventures of a Coxcomb, volume I, Philadelphia: Barrington and Haswell, page 63:
  Positively, these Frenchwomen are wonderful creatures!—There are plenty of clever Englishwomen,—but they are to the manner born. The discreet damsels who write about Political Economy have been swaddled in foolscap and dieted from their youth upwards on printer’s ink; while the astronomeress of forty was made to play with baby-house orreries at four years old.
- 1852 March, The Cardiff and Merthyr Guardian:
  He proposed that all renowned women should be admitted to the franchise:—“Why should not Miss Caroline Herschell^[sic] and Mrs. Somerville, the astronomeresses; the late Mrs Hannah More, Mrs. Fry, and Mrs. Barbauld; Lady Lovelace, the mathematicianess; Mr. Bloomer, Betty Martineau, and hundreds of others, have had the franchise—or any woman who possessed a 40s. freehold?
- 1857, Edwin Martin Stone, The Architect and Monetarian: A Brief Memoir of Thomas Alexander Tefft, Including His Labors in Europe to Establish a Universal Currency‎^[1], Provindence Press Company, published 1869, pages 44, 46, 47:
  London, November 7, 1857. / Dear E., / […] In the evening, Miss Mitchell, our astronomeress was there, and we had a good chat about mutual friends, &c. She is here for a year or so. I hope to meet her again in Rome. […] / Yours, sincerely, / T. A. TEFFT.
- 1873, Wickersham, J. P., editor, The Pennsylvania School Journal, volume XXII, page 145, column 1:
  Grammar.—“So you have finished your studies at the seminary? I was much pleased with the closing exercises. The author of that poem—Miss White, I think you called her—bids fair to become a known poet.” / “We think the authoress will become celebrated as a poetess,” remarked the young lady, pertly, with marked emphasis on two words of the sentence. / “Oh!—ah,” replied the old gentleman looking thoughtfully over his gold spectacles at the young lady: “I hear her sister was quite an actress, and under Mr. Hosmer’s instructions will undoubtedly become quite a sculptoress.” / The young lady appeared irritated. / “The seminary,” continued the old man, with imperturbable gravity, “is fortunate in having an efficient board of manageresses. From the presidentess down to the humblest teacheress, unusual talent is shown. There is Miss Harper, who as a chemistress is unequaled, and Miss Knowles has already a reputation as an astronomeress. And in the department of music, few can equal Miss Kellogg as a singeress.” / The young lady did not appear to like the chair she was sitting on. She took the sofa at the other end of the room. / “Yes,” continued the old gentleman, as if talking to himself, “those White sisters are very talented; Mary, I understand, has turned her attention to music and the drama, and will become famous as an actress and painteress, and even as a lecturess.” / A loud slamming of the door caused the old gentleman to look up, and the criticess and grammarianess was gone.
- 1876, The Hartford Herald‎^[2], volume 2, number 37, page 1, column 2:
  Another exercrable innovation is the misuse of the termination ess. Years ago Thackeray protested against “authoress,” but it holds its ground among illiterate writers; and we have twice seen “manageress,” and “supperioress.”^[sic] Last week the most frightful coinage in the World—“preacheress.” Where is this debasement of language to stop? If a woman who preaches is thus styled, surely a lady who drives is a driveress, and one who dreams is a dreameress, and so on to the end of the chapter. Was Caroline Herschel an astronomeress? These corruptions of our fine and flexible language ought to be resisted.
- 1881 June, Hartford Courant, page 2:
  […] taxed to its utmost to give even an approximate estimate of the number of young amateur astronomers and astronomeresses who are sitting up by twos these pleasant evenings to make sure that the brilliant stranger does not escape their observation, […]
- 1893, Millicent Todd Bingham, Ancestors’ Brocades: The Literary Debut of Emily Dickinson‎^[3], Harper & Brothers Publishers, published 1945, page 224:
  Glimpsewood / Dublin, N.H. / July 9, 1893 / Dear friend / I don’t like not to know more about you & the book too. Do you think my chapter will go in as it is, or do you wish for change; & will you send me proofs? I wish you were coming up here, as your sister astronomeress, Mrs. Pickering, did last year. I am sure there is plenty to consult about. Shall you be in Amherst? / Ever cordially / T. W. Higginson
- [1905, Robert Grier Cooke, “VII. English”, in Casual Essays of The Sun: Editorial Articles on Many Subjects, Clothed with the Philosophy of the Bright Side of Things‎^[4], New York, A New Ship, page 263:
  Since trade has assumed a dignity and importance that the most deeply rooted prejudices of aristocracy have given way to, salesmanship is a word that has a natural right to a place in the dictionary. But against a special form for the feminine gender, all guardians of good English and womanly dignity will be unalterably opposed. They would have no more use for salesladyship than for astronomeress or mathematicianess.]
- 1929 April, “The World-Wrecker by Arlton Eadie”, in Weird Tales: A Magazine of the Bizarre and Unusual‎^[5], volume XIII, number 4, Popular Fiction Publishing Company, page 457, column 1:
  “Is that so?” smiled Terry. “I must really apologize for my mistake. I had no idea that I was talking to an astronomeress—if that’s the correct term to use. You see, you looked so⸺” / “So stupid?” she suggested helpfully. / “Of course not!” he denied indignantly. “No, you looked so”—he was about to say “pretty,” but he had the readiness to change it to—“so unlike what I’ve always imagined a lady professor to look.”
- 1949, The New England Quarterly, page 412:
  The “lady astronomeress,” however, had been formed in a unique milieu, the Quaker community of Nantucket, where equality of the sexes was an article of faith constantly practiced.
- 1957, Elizabeth Klein Bridgman, “Maria Mitchell”, in Pioneers in Progress: Chorus for American Women‎^[6], page 17:
  chorus: America is not two-dimensional. / It is more than north-and-south, or east-and-west. / Up above, where the Perseid showers fall, / is in the third dimension. / She who knew it best / was sweeping a Great Bear region the width of her thumb / when a comet fell in her glass like a ripe plum. / Nantucket and the stars were her address. / Observe in transit the “lady astronomeress.” / call maria mitchell.
- 1967, J. H. B. Peel, Portrait of the Thames (from Teddington to the Source), page 41:
  On the right bank stands Datchet, which even now retains traces of a seamanly past—its boats, its “beach”, its white-topped boatmen. Datchet was the nest of a very rare bird indeed, an astronomeress, Caroline Herschel, sister to the great William, who, from his bachelor home in Bath, struck up a quasi-scientific friendship with George III.
- 2008 June 23, Anim8rFSK, “Re: Sarah Silverman, Norm MacDonald panelists in "Match Game" pilot”, in rec.arts.tv (Usenet), message-ID <ANIM8Rfsk-4F5CB1.12183423062008@news.west.cox.net>:
  I have no idea why they cast her (it certainly wasn't stunt casting since I don't think anybody had ever heard of her before) but she was fine in the role as the large breasted astronomeress.
- a. 2009, Mary Brück, Women in Early British and Irish Astronomy: Stars and Satellites, Springer Science+Business Media, published 2009, →ISBN, page 111:
  ‘ […] the only female observer of these bodies, the comet of 1847 having been independently detected by two ladies, Ms. Maria Mitchell of Nantucket, U.S., and Madame Rümker of Hamburg, the priority lying with the American astronomeress’.

Synonyms

astronomess