Goddess: A Female Deity, and a Modern Compliment
A goddess is a female god. The word has also become a way of praising a woman, which says something about how it is understood.
A goddess is a female deity. Modern English also uses the word as flattery — a domestic goddess, a screen goddess — and it always implies effortless mastery. Nobody is called a goddess for trying hard.
- A female deity. *The goddess of the hunt.*
- An admired woman. *A screen goddess.*
- Goddess in compounds. *Domestic goddess.*
Word forms
| Form | Word | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Noun | goddess | An ancient goddess. |
| Plural | goddesses | The goddesses of Olympus. |
| Male | god | A sky god. |
| Adjective | divine | Divine intervention. |
| Related | deity | A local deity. |
How it is used in a sentence
- Athena was the goddess of wisdom and warfare.Goddess of names the domain.
- The temple was dedicated to the goddess.With the, when the deity is known.
- She was a goddess of 1950s cinema.The admiring modern use.
Goddesses people name
- Athena — wisdom, craft and war, in Greece
- Isis — magic and healing, in Egypt
- Freyja — love and battle, among the Norse
- Lakshmi — fortune and prosperity, in Hinduism
- Amaterasu — the sun, in Japan
From *god* plus the feminine ending *-ess*, borrowed from French. English once made dozens of these — poetess, authoress, doctress — and has since abandoned most of them.
Why do most *-ess* words sound old-fashioned now?
Because English has moved towards using one word for both: actor, author, poet. Goddess survives because the male word means something different.
Goddess or deity?
Deity is neutral and formal, covering any god. Goddess names the gender explicitly.