demirep

From demi- +‎ reputation.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈdɛmiːɹɛp/

demirep (plural demireps)

1. (colloquial, dated) A woman of doubtful reputation or suspected character; an adventuress.
   • 1749, Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, Folio Society, published 1973, page 569:

     he had no knowledge of that character which is vulgarly called a demirep; that is to say, a woman who intrigues with every man she likes, under the name and appearance of virtue [...] in short, whom everybody knows to be what nobody calls her.

   • 1777, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The School for Scandal, I.i:

     Madam by this Time Lady Brittle is the Talk of half the Town—and I doubt not in a week the Men will toast her as a Demirep.

   • 1813, Leigh Hunt, in a journal article about the prince.(Chambers, R.. "'The Book of Days': A miscellany of popular antiquities. Londres: W & R Chambers, 1832." Google Books):

     […] in short, this delightful, blissful, wise, pleasurable, honourable, virtuous, true, and immortal prince, was a violator of his word, a libertine, over head and ears in disgrace, a despiser of domestic ties, the companion of gamblers and demireps […] .

   • 1822, Thomas de Quincey, Confessions of an English Opium-Eater:

     […] the greater part of our confessions (that is, spontaneous and extra-judicial confessions) proceed from demireps, adventurers, or swindlers […] .

   • 1904, Oscar Wilde, The Ballad of Reading Gaol:

     With the mincing step of a demirep / Some sidled up the stairs […] .

   • 1932, Duff Cooper, Talleyrand, Folio Society, published 2010, page 65:

     In this new world, ruled by charlatans and dominated by demireps, Talleyrand may have found much to shock his sense of decorum, but little to outrage his moral standards.

• “demirep”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

• epiderm, impeder, per diem, remiped