A female domestic servant who worked in a household, especially in Victorian and earlier times, cleaning and doing household chores.
From 'house' + 'maid' (from Old English 'mægden,' a young woman). This compound emerged as a specific job title during the medieval period and remained standard until servants became less common in the 20th century.
In Victorian novels, housemaids had strict hierarchies—a 'house maid' was below a 'lady's maid,' who served the mistress, and both were below a 'parlor maid'—the Victorian household was a small bureaucracy of domestic labor.
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