Other forms: stepmothers
A stepmother is your father's new wife, who is not your birth mother. A wicked stepmother, my stepmother, a kind stepmother.
Fairy tales gave the word a reputation it has never shaken, and the wicked stepmother is one of the most persistent figures in European storytelling — partly because so many mothers died in childbirth and so many households were remade. Note that the step- prefix comes from an Old English word meaning bereaved.
1nounstepmotherA father's wife who is not one's birth mother.
“Her father married again, and she got on well with her new stepmother.”
stepmother is a family relation.
Also accepted in games: stepmom, stepmum
Old English steopmodor is step- plus mother. The step- comes from a root meaning bereaved or orphaned.
Proto-Germanic
*steupamōdēr — stepmother
Old English
stēopmōdor
Middle English
stepmoder
English, today
stepmother
From Middle English stepmoder, from Old English stēopmōdor, from Proto-Germanic steupamōdēr (“stepmother”), corresponding to step + mother. Cognate with stq Stäifmuur (“stepmother”), Dutch stiefmoeder (“stepmother”), German Low German Steevmoder (“stepmother”), German Stiefmutter (“stepmother”), Danish stedmor (“stepmother”), Swedish styvmor (“stepmother”), Icelandic stjúpmóðir (“stepmother”). Compare also West Frisian styfmem (“stepmother”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA