Other forms: addressees
The addressee is the person a letter is written to. Return to the addressee, the addressee is unknown, deliver to the addressee.
It is postal and legal language, used where you and the reader would say the recipient. Note the -ee ending, which names the person something is done to — employee, payee, addressee — as against the -er who does it.
1nounaddresseeThe person a letter is written to.
“The letter was returned because the addressee had moved away.”
addressee is a recipient.
Proto-Indo-European
*h₃reǵ-
Middle English
adressen
English
address
English, today
addressee
Built from
From address + -ee. address comes from Middle English adressen. From Middle English adressen (“to raise erect, adorn”), from Old French adrecier (“to straighten, address”) (modern French adresser), from roa-pro addīrēctiāre, from ad- (“to; towards”) + dīrēctiāre (“to guide; to direct”), from Latin dīrēctus (“straight; right”), from dīrigō (“to lay straight; to direct”), itself from regō (“to govern, to rule”). Cognate with Spanish aderezar (“to garnish; dress (food); to add spices”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA