Mistress vs. Principal — What's the Difference?

A woman who has a continuing sexual relationship with a man who is married to someone else.

First in order of importance; main

A woman in a position of authority, control, or ownership, as the head of a household

Denoting an original sum invested or lent

A woman who owns or keeps an animal

The most important or senior person in an organization or group

A woman who owns a slave.

A sum of money lent or invested, on which interest is paid

A woman with ultimate control over something

A person for whom another acts as an agent or representative

A nation or country that has supremacy over others

The person directly responsible for a crime.

Something personified as female that directs or reigns

A main rafter supporting purlins.

A woman who has mastered a skill or branch of learning

An organ stop sounding a main register of open flue pipes typically an octave above the diapason

Mistress Used formerly as a courtesy title when speaking to or of a woman.

First or highest in rank or importance.

Chiefly British A woman schoolteacher.

Of, relating to, or being financial principal, or a principal in a financial transaction.

A woman, specifically one with great control, authority or ownership

One who holds a position of presiding rank, especially the head of an elementary school, middle school, or high school.

A female teacher

A main participant in a situation, especially a financial transaction.

The other woman in an extramarital relationship, generally including sexual relations

A person having a leading or starring role in a performance, such as the first player in a section of an orchestra.

A dominatrix

An amount of capital originally borrowed or invested, as opposed to the interest paid or accruing on it.

A woman well skilled in anything, or having the mastery over it

The most significant part of an estate, as opposed to minor or incidental components.

A woman regarded with love and devotion; a sweetheart

The person on behalf of whom an agent acts.

(Scotland) A married woman; a wife

The person having prime responsibility for an obligation as distinguished from one who acts as surety or as an endorser.

(obsolete) The jack in the game of bowls

The main actor in the perpetration of a crime.

A female companion to a master a man with control, authority or ownership

(Architecture) Either of a pair of inclined timbers forming the sides of a triangular truss for a pitched roof.

Female equivalent of master

Primary; most important; first level in importance.

Female equivalent of mister

Of or relating to a prince; princely.

Of a woman: to master; to learn or develop to a high degree of proficiency.

(mathematics) Chosen or assumed among a branch of possible values of a multi-valued function so that the function is single-valued.

(intransitive) To act or take the role of a mistress.

The money originally invested or loaned, on which basis interest and returns are calculated.

A woman having power, authority, or ownership; a woman who exercises authority, is chief, etc.; the female head of a family, a school, etc.

The chief administrator of a school.

A woman well skilled in anything, or having the mastery over it.

The chief executive and chief academic officer of a university or college.

A woman regarded with love and devotion; she who has command over one's heart; a beloved object; a sweetheart.

(legal) A legal person that authorizes another (the agent) to act on their behalf; or on whose behalf an agent or gestor in a negotiorum gestio acts.

A woman filling the place, but without the rights, of a wife; a woman having an ongoing usually exclusive sexual relationship with a man, who may provide her with financial support in return; a concubine; a loose woman with whom one consorts habitually; as, both his wife and his mistress attended his funeral.

(legal) The primary participant in a crime.

A title of courtesy formerly prefixed to the name of a woman, married or unmarried, but now superseded by the contracted forms, Mrs., for a married, and Miss, for an unmarried, woman.

(North America) A partner or owner of a business.

A married woman; a wife.

(music) A diapason, a type of organ stop on a pipe organ.

The old name of the jack at bowls.

The construction that gives shape and strength to a roof, generally a truss of timber or iron; or, loosely, the most important member of a piece of framing.

To wait upon a mistress; to be courting.

The first two long feathers of a hawk's wing.

An adulterous woman; a woman who has an ongoing extramarital sexual relationship with a man

One of the turrets or pinnacles of waxwork and tapers with which the posts and centre of a funeral hearse were formerly crowned

A woman schoolteacher (especially one regarded as strict)

(obsolete) An essential point or rule; a principle.

A woman master who directs the work of others

A dancer at the highest rank within a professional dance company, particularly a ballet company.

(computing) A security principal.

Highest in rank, authority, character, importance, or degree; most considerable or important; chief; main; as, the principal officers of a Government; the principal men of a state; the principal productions of a country; the principal arguments in a case.

Of or pertaining to a prince; princely.

A leader, chief, or head; one who takes the lead; one who acts independently, or who has controlling authority or influence; as, the principal of a faction, a school, a firm, etc.; - distinguished from a subordinate, abettor, auxiliary, or assistant.

The chief actor in a crime, or an abettor who is present at it, - as distinguished from an accessory.

A thing of chief or prime importance; something fundamental or especially conspicuous.

The original amount of a debt on which interest is calculated

The educator who has executive authority for a school;

An actor who plays a principal role

Capital as contrasted with the income derived from it

The major party to a financial transaction at a stock exchange; buys and sells for his own account

Most important element;