meesterin

Meesterin is a historical or rare feminine form of the Dutch noun meester, meaning a master or teacher in the sense of a skilled practitioner or guild master. The form is largely obsolete in contemporary usage and is considered archaic or dialectal in most contexts. In standard modern Dutch, the feminine form is typically expressed with meesteres, or the language is kept gender-neutral when referring to the profession.

Etymology and variations: Meesterin is formed from the masculine meester with the suffix -in, a pattern seen in several Dutch agent nouns. However, this suffix is not productive in present-day Dutch for the word meester, and the corresponding feminine form is mainly encountered in older texts or regional speech. The more common modern feminine form is meesteres, while some contexts simply use the masculine meester as a gender-neutral title.

Usage and context: In historical sources, a woman who held the status of a master craftsman or a master in a guild might be described with the term meesterin, but such usage is rare and often replaced by meesteres or by context without a gendered title. Today, meesterin is typically cited in discussions of language history, dialectology, or philology rather than in everyday language.

Relation to other terms: The German equivalent Meisterin shares a similar meaning but belongs to a different linguistic tradition. In Dutch, the contemporary equivalents for female mastery are usually meesteres or a gender-neutral phrasing when referring to the profession.

Examples: In de 18de eeuw werd wel eens het woord meesterin gebruikt om een vrouwelijke meester aan te duiden. In hedendaags Nederlands wordt meestal meesteres gebruikt om een vrouwelijke meester aan te duiden; soms volstaat ook de mannelijke vorm als genderneutrale verwijzing.