noun
- Samson’s mistress, who betrayed him to the Philistines. Judges 16.
- a seductive and treacherous woman.
- a female given name: from a Hebrew word meaning “delicate.”
noun
- Samson’s Philistine mistress, who deprived him of his strength by cutting off his hair (Judges 16:4–22)
- a voluptuous and treacherous woman; temptress
“temptress, treacherous lover,” 1590s, from the name of the woman who seduced and betrayed Samson in Judges, from Hebrew Delilah, literally “delicate, languishing, amorous,” from Semitic root d-l-l “to hang down, to languish.”