1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Soprano

SOPRANO (a variant of Ital. sovrano, supreme, sovereign, Late Lat. superanus, from super, above), the term applied in music to the highest natural range of the human voice, and often restricted to that range in the female voice, "treble" being used of a boy's voice. Male soprani, either natural or artificially produced, as formerly in the castrati of the papal choirs (see Eunuch), are also found. The female voice whose range is intermediate between that of a soprano or a contralto is termed "mezzo-soprano."