Sapphist

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A woman who is sexually or romantically attracted to other women, often used as a term for a lesbian
2. Someone of the female sex whose romantic and sexual orientation is toward members of her own sex
3. A lesbian, meaning a woman who loves and desires other women rather than men

Etymology: Sappho was a poet from the Greek island of Lesbos around 600 BCE, and her love poems to women made her name a byword for female same-sex desire. "Sapphic" grew out of that association, and "sapphist" follows the same pattern: the suffix "-ist" was added to "sapphic" on the model of "Sapphist," which had already meant an admirer or student of Sappho. The result is a noun for a woman whose desire is directed toward other women. The word thus carries two layers of meaning at once. Its first sense points back to a specific ancient author, and only later did her name become shorthand for a sexual orientation. Readers should note that "sapphist" is distinct from the older "Sapphist" in its primary modern use, where the lowercase form names a person rather than a reader or scholar of the poet.

Synonyms: lesbian