pollster

(pōl'stər)

WORD HISTORY   The suffix -ster is nowadays most familiar in words like pollster, jokester, huckster, where it forms agent nouns that typically denote males. Originally in Old English, however, the suffix (then spelled -estre) was used to form feminine agent nouns. Hoppestre, for example, meant "female dancer." It was occasionally applied to men, but mostly to translate Latin masculine nouns denoting occupations that were usually held by women in Anglo-Saxon society. An example is bæcester, "baker," glossing Latin pistor; it survives as the Modern English name Baxter. In Middle English its use as a masculine suffix became more common in northern England, while in the south it remained limited to feminines. In time the masculine usage became dominant throughout the country, and old feminines in -ster were refashioned by adding the newer feminine suffix -ess (borrowed from French) to them, such as seamstress remade from seamster. In Modern English, the only noun ending in -ster with a feminine referent is spinster, which originally meant "a woman who spins thread."