What is the origin of the term 'gold-digger'?
450172
1920's slang.\nhttp://www.odps.org/glossword/index.php?a=term&t=5bb05aacb1acaea4a5
155227
I think it was started when some woman was stolen I dont recall but I know that woman was related to Penelope, Odysseus' wife.
896916
He used the slang term to represent a woman. As for the origin, "broad" was an 18th century term for a playing card. The way woman are connected to the tickets seems to originate in 1914 (see sources):\n\n"Noun, Current amongst genteel grafters chiefly. A female confederate; a female companion, a woman of loose morals. Broad is derived from the far-fetched metaphor of 'meal ticket,' signifying a female provider for a pimp, from the fanciful correspondence of a meal ticket to a railroad or other ticket."
604078
You are mistaken. They just use different words for male gold diggers.\n\n" All heiresses are beautifull".\n\n\nThere are men who marry for money.
58223
Hooking is not a legal term so its hard to say. Legally although it varies from state to state The term "prostitution" generally means the commission by a person of any natural or unnatural sexual act, deviate sexual intercourse, or sexual contact for monetary consideration or other thing of value. \n\nGiven this definition, the only women who are not Prostitutes(including your MBA and the average Housewife) are those who have sex strictly for their own enjoyment and not to recieve anything in value.
1017638
Not all are gold diggers. I think every country has the both sides of it.
681754
Im not sure if the term originated in WWII or  from the Vietnam war. \nBut I know it originated cause solders married local women and brought them to the US after the war.
323931
I'm taking a wild a$$ed educated guess on this one, but I believe that she was referring to the stereotype that they had in the 70's-80's that most girls (or women) that played tennis were gay. (like Billie Jean King and Martina Natratilova). That of course is the lady tennis players are lesbo, no need for condoms..Ha Ha funny! \nThe reference is really sort of dated in this age where Serena Williams, Anna Kounikova, and Maria Sharapova among other star tennis divas today play and are clearly not lesbians.\nAnyway, this is most likely what she's referring to and that character she's portraying is an older character so I think that's where it all fits.
805499
a girl or guy who goes after someone just because theyre rich, like robbing the cradle
641319
Spinster seems to be used mainly for elderly ladies but it just means a woman who never married.\n\nBachelorette is a fairly new word in the context of unmarried girls, it's really a term used for a bride while she is engaged and before she is married.
111517
Seems to be unknown. Can't find any single person credited, so maybe the term just came into popular use around the same time (journalists?). \n\nMaybe look for the earliest use of that term, going back to summer 1929 (predating the Wall Street crash by a few months).\n\n(Does anyone have access to WSJ.com archives, do they go back that far?)
518139
Actually the advice you have been given is incorrect. I have travelled extensively around the world, and have come to find out a golddigger is a golddigger no matter what her color, race, religion, nationality is..
921237
Good question my man. I just think there is too many gold diggers in the world! My cheating ex wife is one of them. I have been looking for five months now and can not find a woman that isn't a gold digger, I have found some nice friends but all the rest are gold diggers! Sorry.
705558
From one of the speeches in Henry VI part 2 (that's a Shakespeare play!)\n\nHere's the speech. The origin of Mum's the word comes in the third line:\n\n\n    Hume must make merry with the duchess' gold;\n    Marry, and shall. But how now, Sir John Hume!\n    Seal up your lips, and give no words but mum:\n    The business asketh silent secrecy.\n    Dame Eleanor gives gold to bring the witch:\n    Gold cannot come amiss, were she a devil.\n    Yet have I gold flies from another coast;\n    I dare not say, from the rich cardinal\n    And from the great and new-made Duke of Suffolk,\n    Yet I do find it so; for to be plain,\n    They, knowing Dame Eleanor's aspiring humour,\n    Have hired me to undermine the duchess\n    And buz these conjurations in her brain.\n    They say 'A crafty knave does need no broker;'\n    Yet am I Suffolk and the cardinal's broker.\n    Hume, if you take not heed, you shall go near\n    To call them both a pair of crafty knaves.\n    Well, so it stands; and thus, I fear, at last\n    Hume's knavery will be the duchess' wreck,\n    And her attainture will be Humphrey's fall:\n    Sort how it will, I shall have gold for all.
1065263
It was an 80's term started up by a click known as Valleygirls.(Look for the old film with the same name to know more on the trend)
1170816
This originated in the early 1980s. It is generally regarded as an American expression. This item from the New York newspaper the Syracuse Herald-American, Feb. 1982, which is the earliest version in print that I can find, puts that in some doubt. It's in a piece by Jerry Buck, writing out of Los Angeles, about actress Lauren Tewes
793676
Sorry you've had such rubbish answers. \n\nI'm usually quite good at this sort of thing, but I'm afraid I can't find any info on the origins of this phrase.\n\nI hope someone more knowledgeable answers you soon!