Wiktionary

Cinderella

See also: cinderella

English

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Cinderella.

Alternative forms

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Etymology

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From cinder + -ella, as in little cinder girl. Compare French Cendrillon.

Pronunciation

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Proper noun

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Cinderella (plural Cinderellas)

  1. A popular fairy tale embodying a classic folk tale myth-element of unjust oppression and triumphant reward.
  2. The main character in this story, a mistreated and impoverished girl.
    • 1988 May 16, Melissa Merlie, “Dancing the night away”, in Chillicothe Gazette, volume 189, number 39, Chillicothe, Ohio, page 1B, column 2:
      The girls look like Southern belles or Cinderellas. The prom’s theme is Cinderellian: “Until Midnight.” Little, clear slippers sit on the 30 cloth- and candle-covered tables on the tarp-covered gymnasium floor.
    • 2014, Kathryn Harrison, Joan of Arc: A Life Transfigured, Doubleday, →ISBN:
      Womanly duties, as Joan thought of them, were fine for girls who imagined themselves as Cinderellas or Sleeping Beauties, good girls rewarded for menial housework and, in the case of Sleeping Beauty, a passivity so profound it was deaf, dumb, blind, and comatose.
    • 2018, Jen Kim, Love and…: Bad Boys, “The One” & Other Fun Ways to Sabotage Your Relationship, Skyhorse Publishing, →ISBN:
      All the miniature Cinderellas, Belles, and Ariels who fill the streets every Halloween are essentially paying homage to characters that will slowly and inevitably chip away at their sense of worth in years to come.
  3. (rare) A female given name originating as a coinage.

Derived terms

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terms derived from Cinderella

Translations

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Noun

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Cinderella (plural Cinderellas)

  1. (by analogy) A mistreated and impoverished girl.
  2. (attributive) Something rising unexpectedly from obscurity to success, as a Cinderella team.
  3. (attributive) Something neglected and denied resources, as a Cinderella service.
    Cinderella State (in Australia)
    • 2020 January 2, David Clough, “How InterCity came back from the brink”, in Rail, page 64:
      A very early example of this can be seen in the case of the Midland Main Line (MML). At the start of 1982, this was the Cinderella of the InterCity portfolio but building more High Speed Trains (HSTs) to replace 90mph trainsets was out of the question. During 1982-83, Bleasdale shuffled his HST pack by taking sets from the Eastern and Western Regions and allocated these to the MML.
  4. (attributive, informal, colloquial) A procedure or surgery to reshape the feet.
    • 2014 April 22, Laren Stover, “Make Them Fit, Please!”, in The New York Times‎[1], archived from the original on 2014-09-14:
      For Dr. Sadrieh (who was wearing made-to-order Gucci brogues), foot surgery is a fusion of medicine and fairy tale. At his practice, you don’t have a bunionectomy; you have a Cinderella procedure.
    • 2020, Robert Wainwright, Enid: The Scandalous High-society Life of the Formidable 'Lady Killmore', Allen & Unwin, page 125:
      By the mid-1930s prominent members of society, including the aristocracy, were paying hefty fees for this Cinderella surgery, correcting double chins, reshaping noses and smoothing wrinkles and creases, even having stomach tucks.
  5. (philately) A stamp or stamp-like label issued for purposes other than postal administration, not issued by a central government, or not listed in most general catalogues.
  6. (rare, derogatory) A woman employed to clean, especially to remove ash from stoves and fireplaces.

References

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  • L. N. and M. Williams, Cinderella Stamps, London, Heinemann, 1970

Further reading

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