the.com/woman
An adult human female, equal in worth and dignity to any other person.
means An adult human female.
from From Old English 'wifman,' a compound of 'wif' (woman — which originally meant simply 'woman' or 'wife,' not yet narrowed to marriage) and 'man' (at the time a general word for 'person,' not specifically male). Over centuries 'wifman' wore down into 'woman,' while 'man' drifted to mean specifically male — leaving the odd residue of a word for 'female person' literally built from 'female' plus 'person.' The vowel in 'wif' also shifted oddly over time, which is why 'women' sounds like 'wimen' instead of rhyming with 'woman.'
- chromosomes
- XX, usually — biology allows exceptions
- longevity edge
- outlives men in nearly every country
- etymology
- from wifmann, old english for female human
- voting rights
- universal suffrage is barely a century old