Mary

[Spookypig]

I love Mary. Which is weird because as a child I remember reading the Secret Garden and literally shuddering over the name, thinking how awful it was! But it has grown on me over the years and now I love it. I’m also fond of Maria. What do you think - are they lovely and timeless and sounding fresh again after being less popular for years? Or… not?

I love it but it was my Mum’s name so I’m probably biased! I know a Mary in her early 50s but no others. Would like to hear of some little Marys.

I love Mary! I knew a teenage Mary a few years ago and she was very cool and bohemian.

One of my friends has a Mary who’s now in her 20s. It did feel a bit old ladyish at the time. Those kinds of names are probably more popular now.

My sister’s called Maria Grace, I think it’s a very pretty name. But Mary is equally nice.

Martha is lovely too

I consider it dated. But I also don’t think that classic names are automatically timeless and immune to dating. A name dating to me is solely dependent on modern pattern of use rather than how old and established a name is. Mary was a top ten name until 1954 in England and Wales, before dropping precipitously and falling out of the top hundred totally by 1984 and not returning. That’s more than one generation of disuse, and the name is still on a downward trend in popularity and I can’t see Mary having a significant revival in the near future.

When most people hear the name Mary, they are expecting to see someone in their 70s or older as statistically that’s who’s likely to have the name. Mary to me is my great Aunt, an old lady at church or my grandmother’s friend, rather than someone who I went to school with or name of my friends’ daughters. And that’s what a dated name means to me, when it’s more associated with one generation than another meaning you get an age association with the name. Jason and Helen are also ancient names, but dated as they’ve peaked and fallen in popularity so are classic but not timeless names. Alexander is a name which has a sustained history of use in modern times (since 1904) and doesn’t feel tied to any generation so is both classic and timeless.

I agree @toastofthetown, but names that sound dated just need a few people to start using them and then a new wave starts. When a friend told me 16 years ago she was calling her baby son Frank, I almost laughed because it was just an old man’s name to me. It doesn’t sound at all odd to me now.

Ditto Stanley, Fred, Ivy, Iris, Violet etc. Until fairly recently, a lot of us would have laughed at the idea of giving any of those names to a baby, but now there are tons of babies and children with those names.

I have no idea why but the name Mary always
Makes me feel
Depressed

Absolutely love Mary! Beautiful name. I also like Marie, but Mary best of all.

I work with a young Mary (early twenties) she’s dynamic, articulate, hard-working and a generally all round lovely person. Everything I’d want my daughter to be when she’s grown up so that’s a big thumbs up for Mary for me! It’s also my middle name and I quite like it. I think it’s quite pretty and soft. Overused in the past maybe but not now.

It's slang for vagina where I'm from .
So won't get a revival anytime soon around these parts.

Prefer Mary to Maria x

They are names that I remember from seeing Coronation Street in my grandmother's house as a young child.
If you'd told me 25 years ago that I'd be hearing names like Ivy, Stan, Frank and Elsie called out at young children, I'd not have believed you.

I think its fine, a bit drippy but I think thats the 'has a little lamb' vibe- makes me imagine a prissy blonde child in a frilly shepherdess outfit.
I like Maria though, there is something stronger about it

<looks at my toddler Mary>

Not seeing that one

I love Mary, but I am also biased. We chose it because it's classic and it's easy to say and spell, and forms of it exist in lots of cultures and languages. We haven't met any other little Marys, though.

I like Mary. It was my gran's name so I did use to see it as an old woman's name but I think it's due for a revival and does seem fresh and different on a young girl.

I think Maria is nice but I guess because I've lived in Spanish-speaking countries where every fourth woman is called it, it doesn't seem so special to me.

I'm in Scotland and I did consider the Gaelic form of Mairi which is nice too.

I probably wouldn't have that acossiation if I had ever met a Mary. I never have as its not very common anymore but there was a massive poster in my primary school library of the little lamb Mary with ringlets in a big pink poofy dress, with a pink bubble written phrase like 'little miss Mary has lost her sheep but she has found a love of reading" 😂
Also the baby from 3 men and a baby.

It's an old lady's name. I don't think it would suit a baby/young girl.

I think it’s definitely due revival.
I always associate it with Lady Mary Crawley from Downton Abbey.

It means vagina here too.

Its my middle name, I hate it, and it means vagina

Where does it mean 'Vagina', out of interest? I've never heard that before.

It is a little bit bookish but the look of the letters and the sound are aesthetically pleasing. I think it's nice actually OP.

Home counties
Really old fashioned I think, as I haven’t heard anyone young say that