Master is an
English honorific
In the English language, an honorific is a form of address conveying esteem, courtesy or respect. These can be titles prefixing a person's name, ''e.g.'': ''Mr'', ''Mrs'', ''Miss'', ''Ms'', ''Mx'', ''Sir'', ''Dame'', ''Dr'', ''Cllr'', ''Lady'', ...
for boys and young men. It is usually abbreviated to MSTR or Mstr.
Etymology
''Master'' was used in England for men of some rank, especially "free masters" of a trade
guild
A guild ( ) is an association of artisans and merchants who oversee the practice of their craft/trade in a particular territory. The earliest types of guild formed as organizations of tradespeople belonging to a professional association. They so ...
and by any manual worker or servant employee addressing his employer (his master), but also generally by those lower in status to
gentlemen, priests, or scholars. In the Elizabethan period, it was used between equals, especially to a group ("My masters"), mainly by urban
artisan
An artisan (from , ) is a skilled craft worker who makes or creates material objects partly or entirely by hand. These objects may be functional or strictly decorative, for example furniture, decorative art, sculpture, clothing, food ite ...
s and tradespeople. It was later extended to all respectable men and was the forerunner of ''
Mister''. The proper title of
William Shakespeare's First Folio
''Mr. William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies'' is a collection of plays by William Shakespeare, commonly referred to by modern scholars as the First Folio, published in 1623, about seven years after Shakespeare's death. It is cons ...
is pronounced ''Master William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies''.
After its replacement in common speech by ''Mister'', ''Master'' was retained as a
form of address
Address terms are linguistic expressions used by a speaker to start conversation or call someone. George Yule defines address form as a word or phrase that is used for a person to whom speaker wants to talk. Address forms or address terms are so ...
only for boys who had not yet entered society. By the late 19th century,
etiquette
Etiquette ( /ˈɛtikɛt, -kɪt/) can be defined as a set of norms of personal behavior in polite society, usually occurring in the form of an ethical code of the expected and accepted social behaviors that accord with the conventions and ...
dictated that men be addressed as ''Mister'', and boys as ''Master''.
Current usage in the United Kingdom
The use of ''Master'' as a prefixed title is, according to
Leslie Dunkling, "a way of addressing politely a boy ... too young to be called 'Mister'." It can be used as a title and form of address for any boy.
''Master'' was used sometimes, especially up to the late 19th century, to describe the male head of a large estate or household who employed
domestic worker
A domestic worker is a person who works within a residence and performs a variety of household services for an individual, from providing cleaning and household maintenance, or cooking, laundry and ironing, or care for children and elderly ...
s.
The heir to a
Scottish peerage
The Peerage of Scotland (; ) is one of the five divisions of peerages in the United Kingdom and for those peers created by the King of Scots before 1707. Following that year's Treaty of Union 1707, Treaty of Union, the Kingdom of Scots and the ...
may use the style or dignity "
Master of" followed by the name associated with the peerage. For instance, the heir of
Lord Elphinstone is known as the Master of Elphinstone.
Current usage in the United States
Nancy Tuckerman, in the ''
Amy Vanderbilt Complete Book of Etiquette'', writes that in the United States, unlike the UK, a boy can be addressed as ''Master'' only until age 12, then is addressed only by his name with no title until he turns 18, when he takes the title of ''Mr.'',
although it is not improper to use ''Mr.'' if he is slightly younger.
Other extant usage
In the 21st century, ''Master'' as an honorific or more often ''master'' as a professional term still has some use in reference to advanced workers (not always male) in
the trades, and sometimes also to academics and educators. However, it is more frequently used as an
adjective
An adjective (abbreviations, abbreviated ) is a word that describes or defines a noun or noun phrase. Its semantic role is to change information given by the noun.
Traditionally, adjectives are considered one of the main part of speech, parts of ...
for this purpose (e.g. "master bricklayer"), or with an adjective ("school master", "headmaster").
''Master'' is also frequently used (along with feminine ''Mistress'' or ''Domina'') in the
BDSM community[Guy Baldwin (2002). ''SlaveCraft: Roadmaps for Erotic Servitude – Principles, Skills and Tools.'' Daedelus Publishing Co. pp. 57–62. .] as a self-identifier by dominants, and by
submissives in addressing them, especially in
master/slave-roleplay relationships.
References
{{Social titles
Men's social titles
Honorifics