A milkmaid is a girl or woman employed to milk dairy cows. She also used the milk

Milk

Milk is a white liquid produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals before they are able to digest other types of food. Early-lactation milk contains colostrum, which carries the mother's antibodies to the baby and can reduce the risk of many...

 to prepare dairy products such as cream

Cream

Cream is a dairy product that is composed of the higher-butterfat layer skimmed from the top of milk before homogenization. In un-homogenized milk, over time, the lighter fat rises to the top. In the industrial production of cream this process is accelerated by using centrifuges called "separators"...

, butter

Butter

Butter is a dairy product made by churning fresh or fermented cream or milk. It is generally used as a spread and a condiment, as well as in cooking applications, such as baking, sauce making, and pan frying...

, and cheese

Cheese

Cheese is a generic term for a diverse group of milk-based food products. Cheese is produced throughout the world in wide-ranging flavors, textures, and forms....

. The term milkmaid is not the female equivalent of milkman

Milkman

A milkman is a person, traditionally male, who delivers milk in milk bottles or cartons. Milk deliveries frequently occur in the morning and it is not uncommon for milkmen to deliver products other than milk such as eggs, cream, cheese, butter, yogurt or soft drinks...

in the sense of one who delivers milk to the consumer; it is the female equivalent of milkman in the sense of cowman

Cowman (profession)

A cowman is a person who works specifically with cattle.-Usage:Usage of the word "cowman" has significant geographic variation, though is sometimes used interchangeably with terms such as "stockman", "cattleman", "rancher" and "grazier."...

.

"As smooth as a milk maid's skin"

The expression "as smooth as a milk maid's skin" means exceptionally smooth.

This phrase came about as a result of exposure to cowpox

Cowpox

Cowpox is a skin disease caused by a virus known as the Cowpox virus. The pox is related to the vaccinia virus and got its name from the distribution of the disease when dairymaids touched the udders of infected cows. The ailment manifests itself in the form of red blisters and is transmitted by...

, which causes no serious symptoms, but does convey a partial immunity

Immunity (medical)

Immunity is a biological term that describes a state of having sufficient biological defenses to avoid infection, disease, or other unwanted biological invasion. Immunity involves both specific and non-specific components. The non-specific components act either as barriers or as eliminators of wide...

 to the disfiguring (and often fatal) disease smallpox

Smallpox

Smallpox was an infectious disease unique to humans, caused by either of two virus variants, Variola major and Variola minor. The disease is also known by the Latin names Variola or Variola vera, which is a derivative of the Latin varius, meaning "spotted", or varus, meaning "pimple"...

. Thus, milkmaids lacked the "pockmarked" complexion common to smallpox survivors. This observation led to the development of the first vaccine

Vaccine

A vaccine is a biological preparation that improves immunity to a particular disease. A vaccine typically contains an agent that resembles a disease-causing microorganism, and is often made from weakened or killed forms of the microbe or its toxins...

.

Cultural references

• The legend of the Dun Cow and the milkmaid who guided the monks of Lindisfarne
  Lindisfarne
  Lindisfarne is a tidal island off the north-east coast of England. It is also known as Holy Island and constitutes a civil parish in Northumberland...
  
   carrying the body of Saint Cuthbert to the site of the present city of Durham
  Durham
  Durham is a city in north east England. It is within the County Durham local government district, and is the county town of the larger ceremonial county...
  
   in 995 AD.
• The eponymous heroine of Thomas Hardy
  Thomas Hardy
  Thomas Hardy, OM was an English novelist and poet. While his works typically belong to the Naturalism movement, several poems display elements of the previous Romantic and Enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural.While he regarded himself primarily as a...
  
  's Tess of the d'Urbervilles
  Tess of the d'Urbervilles
  Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented, also known as Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman, Tess of the d'Urbervilles or just Tess, is a novel by Thomas Hardy, first published in 1891. It initially appeared in a censored and serialised version, published by the British...
  
  works as a milkmaid.
• There is a famous painting by Johannes Vermeer
  Johannes Vermeer
  Johannes, Jan or Johan Vermeer was a Dutch painter who specialized in exquisite, domestic interior scenes of middle class life. Vermeer was a moderately successful provincial genre painter in his lifetime...
  
   entitled The Milkmaid
  The Milkmaid (Vermeer)
  The Milkmaid , sometimes called The Kitchen Maid, is an oil-on-canvas painting of a "milkmaid", in fact a domestic kitchen maid, by the Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer...
  
  (ca. 1658). Aelbert Cuyp
  Aelbert Cuyp
  Aelbert Jacobsz Cuyp was one of the leading Dutch landscape painters of the Dutch Golden Age in the 17th century. The most famous of a family of painters, the pupil of his father Jacob Gerritsz...
  
  , another Dutch
  Netherlands
  The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
  
   artist, created the drawing known as A Milkmaid (ca. 1640–1650).
• The California native flower commonly called Milkmaids
  Cardamine californica
  Cardamine californica , is a flowering plant in the family Brassicaceae, native to western North America from Washington to California and Baja California. It is common on shady slopes and grasslands in the winter and early spring.-Description:Cardamine californica is herbaceous perennial plant...
  
   is named for its resemblance to the hat often worn by milkmaids.
• Kid Harpoon
  Kid Harpoon
  Kid Harpoon is an English singer-songwriter and musician.- Career :Originally hailing from Chatham, Kid Harpoon began to play live locally at venues such as The Tap & Tin and Command House...
  
   has a song called Milkmaid; the music video features actress Juno Temple
  Juno Temple
  -Early life:Juno Temple was born in London, and is the daughter of producer Amanda Pirie and film director Julien Temple. She grew up in Somerset, England and attended Enmore Primary School, Bedales School, and King's College, Taunton...
  
  .
• The 12 days of Christmas' 8th day mentions a maid-a-milking aka milk maid.
• The Philippines has a condensed milk brand called Milkmaid, a product of Alaska Milk Corporation.