How to say “lady” in Hebrew

 

גְּבִירָה[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/גבירה-1.mp3″ /]

 

Last week I posted about what a man is called Hebrew. I said that while Hebrew has three common words for this, it only has one for woman – אִשָּׁה[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/גבירה-2.mp3″ /].

Several people emailed me, asking why I did not include the word גְּבֶרֶת[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/גבירה-3.mp3″ /] as another way of saying woman.

Here’s why.

גברת is not used to mean woman the way אישה is. Rather, גברת means ma’am, madam or Mrs.

A couple of examples:

[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/גבירה-4.mp3″ /]גְּבֶרֶת חָדָד מַגִּיעָה הַיּוֹם?

Is Mrs. Hadad is coming today?

and

[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/גבירה-5.mp3″ /]גְּבֶרֶת, לָמָּה לֹא תִּקְנִי שְׁנַיִם, הֵם בְּמִבְצָע!

Ma’am, why don’t you buy two, they’re on sale!

Then there’s another word, גְּבִירָה[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/גבירה-6.mp3″ /], which means lady. But unlike in English, where you might hear someone saying, Lady, you’d better hurry up, there’s a sale, גבירה means lady in the aristocratic sense as it is the feminine version of גְּבִיר[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/גבירה-7.mp3″ /], referring to a lord or master.

For example:

[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/גבירה-8.mp3″ /]כֻּלָּם הִמְתִינוּ בְּקֹצֶר רוּחַ לְהַגַּעַת הַגְּבִיר וְהַגְּבִירָה.

Everyone waited with bated breath for the arrival of the lord and the lady.

All of these words derive from גֶּבֶר[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/גבירה-9.mp3″ /] – the rudimentary word for man, which comes from the root ג.ב.ר (g.b.r) meaning strength and courage.