Madam:
A form of
respectful or polite address (substituted for the name) originally used by
servants in speaking to their mistress.
From the 17th to the early 20th cent. madam was the title
normally used in addressing a letter to a woman of any rank, except where the
use of the name (as in ‘Dear Mrs A.’, etc.) was considered acceptable (‘my
lady’, etc., not being admitted in this context).
While in French the title
has (with certain customary exceptions) been confined to married women, in
English this rule has not been generally adopted, though there are traces of a
tendency in the 16–17th cent. to address married women as ‘madam’ and unmarried
women as ‘mistress’.
Madam
is still the word generally used by persons in positions of service to the
public, spec. by sales
assistants to female customers, and also as a polite or formal form of address
to a woman, esp. one whose name is not known to the speaker.
