Mary

proper noun

1. 1

   A female given name from Aramaic or Hebrew.

   I have a passion for the name of Mary, For once it was a magic sound to me: And still it half calls up the realm of fairy Where I beheld what never was to be.

   Mary, which is as common as a white violet, and like that has something indestructibly sweet and simple, and fit for all wear, high or low, suits the cottage or the palace, the garden or the field, the pretty and the ugly, the old and the young;

   For it was Mary; Mary / Plain as any name can be / But with propriety, society / Will say "Marie". / But it was Mary; Mary / Long before the fashions came / And there's something there that sounds so square / It's a grand old name.

   They had called their children Ann, Mary, and John as a reaction against their own fancy tricksy names. Both mothers thought these names sadly unimaginative and each blamed the child of the other for the lack of vision and style.

2. 2

   The mother of Jesus; believed in Christianity and Islam to have been a virgin, and believed by most Christians to have been born herself without sin, to have been assumed into Heaven without death, and to act as a sympathetic intercessor for believers.

   Now the birth of Jeſus Chriſt was on this wiſe: When as his mother Mary was eſpouſed to Joſeph (before they came together) ſhee was found with childe of the holy Ghoſt.

3. 3

   Any of several other women in the New Testament, notably: Mary Magdalene, a disciple of Jesus.

4. 4

   Any of several other women in the New Testament, notably: Mary of Bethany, the sister of Lazarus and Martha.

   And Jeſus anſwered, and ſaide vnto her, Martha, Martha, thou art carefull, and troubled about many things: But one thing is needefull, and Mary hath choſen that good part, which ſhall not bee taken away from her.

5. 5

   Synonym of Maryam (“The 19th sura (chapter) of the Qur'an”)

6. 6

   slangA term of address for a male homosexual.

   Note also that male homosexuals will call most anyone Bessie or Mary, e.g. ‘Oh, Bessie, you're a camp!’

   In America in the 1950s,... Mary was often used in the vocative to address any fellow homosexual (‘Well, Mary...’).

7. 7

   datedA male middle name, given in honour of the Virgin Mary.

proper noun

1. 1

   A city, the capital of the region of Mary, in southeastern Turkmenistan.

2. 2

   A region in southeastern Turkmenistan.

Forms

plural

Marys, Maries