Female dominance

A dominatrix (plural dominatrixes or dominatrices) is a woman who takes the dominant role in BDSM activities. A dominatrix might be of any sexual orientation, but her orientation does not necessarily limit the genders of her submissive partners. The role of a dominatrix may not even involve physical pain toward the submissive; her domination can be verbal, involving humiliating tasks, or servitude. A dominatrix may be a paid professional ("pro-domme"), or may use the title of dominatrix in her personal sex life.

The term domme is a coined pseudo-French female variation of the slang dom (short for dominant). The use of "domme", "dominatrix", "dom", or "dominant" by any woman in a dominant role is chosen mostly by personal preference and the conventions of the local BDSM scene. The term "mistress" or "dominant mistress" is sometimes also used. "Female dominance" (or "female domination"), popularly known as "femdom", refers to BDSM relationships and BDSM scenes in which the dominant partner is female.

As fetish culture is increasingly becoming more prevalent in Western media, depictions of dominatrices in film and television have become more common.

Dominatrix is the feminine form of the Latin dominator, a ruler or lord, and was originally used in a non-sexual sense. Its use in English dates back to at least 1561. Its earliest recorded use in the prevalent modern sense, as a female dominant in S&M, dates to 1967. It was initially coined to describe a woman who provides punishment-for-pay as one of the case studies within Bruce Roger's pulp paperback The Bizarre Lovemakers. The term was taken up shortly after by the Myron Kosloff title Dominatrix (with art by Eric Stanton) in 1968, and entered more popular mainstream knowledge following the 1976 film Dominatrix Without Mercy.

Although the term "dominatrix" was not used, the classic example in literature of the female dominant-male submissive relationship is portrayed in the 1870 novella Venus in Furs by Austrian writer Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. The term masochism was later derived from the author's name by Richard von Krafft-Ebing in the latter's 1886 forensic study Psychopathia Sexualis.

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