A debutante, also spelled débutante, or deb is a young woman of aristocratic or upper-class family background who has reached maturity and is presented to society at a formal "debut" or possibly debutante ball. Originally, the term meant that the woman was old enough to be married, and part of the purpose of her coming out was to display her to eligible bachelors and their families with a view to marriage within a select circle.
Debutantes at the Chrysanthemum Ball in Munich (2012)
Some attendees of the 2013 Vienna Opera Ball
Young women making their debut accompanied by the younger attendants in Queensland (1948)
An 1890s-era debutante gown
Upper Class in modern societies is the social class composed of people who hold the highest social status, usually are the wealthiest members of class society, and wield the greatest political power. According to this view, the upper class is generally distinguished by immense wealth which is passed on from generation to generation. Prior to the 20th century, the emphasis was on aristocracy, which emphasized generations of inherited noble status, not just recent wealth.
Portrait of the family Fagoga Arozqueta, about 1730. Painter unknown. The family was part of the upper class in Mexico City, New Spain.
Ball in colonial Chile by Pedro Subercaseaux. In Spain's American colonies, the upper classes were made up of Europeans and American born Spaniards and were heavily influenced by European trends.
The upmarket Harrods department store in London, 1909
First edition dust cover of Edith Wharton's 1920 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Age of Innocence, a story set in upper-class New York City in the 1870s
