Commess

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Good-natured trouble; mischief; hanky-panky or high jinks. Caribbean, uncountable

    "Romance, tragedy, a simply sweet love story, shame and scandal in the family, bacchanal, commess and sex at its best have been depicted in thousands of romance novels for generations."

  2. 2
    Gossip about local scandals. Caribbean, uncountable

    "Even the recognition that commess is a pervasive feature of village life does not affect the judgment that it is alien to respectability, to mainstream morality and behavioral propriety. Again villagers are faced with a contradiction between needing to act out their disapproval of deviant sexual activity and their belief that commess is antithetical to good manners and a commitment to mainstream moral and behavioral norms."

Example

More examples

"Romance, tragedy, a simply sweet love story, shame and scandal in the family, bacchanal, commess and sex at its best have been depicted in thousands of romance novels for generations."

Related phrases

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.