suitor

Etymology

From Middle English sutour, from Anglo-Norman suytour, seuter, from Late Latin secutor (“follower, pursuer”).

noun

1. One who pursues someone, especially a woman, for a romantic relationship or marriage; a wooer; one who falls in love with or courts someone.
   (Notice that "Lysias" begins from the realistic assumption that an attractive young man with many suitors will "gratify" one of them, the only question being which. Rightly or wrongly, he treats the question, "Shall I at all?" as already resolved.) 1999, Martha Craven Nussbaum, Sex and Social Justice, page 316
2. (by extension) A person or organization that expresses an interest in working with, or taking over, another.
   […] and Mortimer asserted he had no shortage of suitors ready, willing, and able to make acquisition loans […] 2016, Gary D. McGugan, Three Weeks Less a Day, page 43
3. (law) A party to a suit or litigation.
4. One who sues, petitions, solicits, or entreats; a petitioner.

verb

1. To play the suitor; to woo; to make love.