/kwiːn/
OriginFrom Middle English quene (“young, robust woman”), from Old English cwene (“woman, female serf”), from Proto-West Germanic *kwenā, from Proto-Germanic *kwenǭ (“woman”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʷḗn (“woman”). Doublet of gyne and queen.
Cognate with Dutch kween (“a barren woman, a barren cow”), Low German quene (“barren cow, heifer”), German Kone (“wife”), Swedish kvinna (“woman”), Icelandic kona (“woman”), Gothic 𐌵𐌹𐌽𐍉 (qinō, “woman”), 𐌵𐌴𐌽𐍃 (qēns, “wife”).
- archaicA woman, now especially an impudent or disreputable woman; a prostitute.
“Rahab, that harlot, began to be a professed quean at ten years of age […]”
“However, terrible as it may seem to the tall maiden sisters of J.P.’s in Queen Anne houses with walled vegetable gardens, this courtesan, strumpet, harlot, whore, punk, fille de joie, street-walker, t”
“So ended Lauretta her song, to which all hearkened attentively, though not all interpreted it alike. Some were inclined to give it a moral after the Milanese fashion, to wit, that a good porker was be”
- ScotlandA young woman, a girl; a daughter.
“Forbye the two queans there was the son, John Gordon, as coarse a devil as you’d meet, he’d already had two–three queans in trouble and him but barely eighteen years old.”
Formsqueans(plural) · quine(alternative, Scotland) · quene(alternative, obsolete) · queane(alternative, obsolete)
Source: Wiktionary