Definition of "Maries"

—“Yestreen the queen had four Maries, / The night she’ll hae but three; / There was Marie Seton, and Marie Beatoun, / And Marie Carmichael, and me.”—

1802, “Lament of the Queen’s Marie”, in Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border: […], volume II, Kelso: James Ballantyne, for T. Cadell, Jun. and W. Davies, […], page 154

The Bedroom, with its fine ceiling, was occupied successively by Marie de Médicis, Marie Thérèse, Marie Antoinette, Joséphine, Marie Louise, Marie Amélie, and the Empress Eugénie, and is sometimes known as the ‘Chamber of the five Maries.’

1922, Findlay Muirhead, editor, Paris and Its Environs, page 352

Marie who? A number of suggestions have been proposed for the identity of this wonderful twelfth-century poet. Marie, Abbess of Shaftesbury, the illegitimate daughter of Geoffrey Plantagenet and half-sister to Henry II, King of England, is a plausible candidate, but Marie, Abbess of Reading, Marie I of Boulogne, Marie, Abbess of Barking, and Marie de Meulan, wife of Hugh Talbot, are all possibilities. There were a lot of Maries, after all, but only a few could read and write in English, Latin, and Anglo-Norman French.

2013, David R. Slavitt, “Foreword”, in The Lays of Marie de France, Athabasca University Press, page IX

I here join the other Mary with Mary Magdalene; for tho’ I think it is pretty plain from St John, that ſhe alone brought this Account; yet it is remarkable that in her Narration ſhe ſays, We know not where they have laid him, ſpeaking, as it were, in the Name of the other Mary and her own; and doubtleſs ſhe did not omit to acquaint them that the other Mary came with her to the Sepulchre; ſo that this Report, tho’ made by Mary Magdalene alone, may fairly be taken for the joint Report of the two Maries, and was probably ſtiled ſo by Peter and John, and therefore repreſented as ſuch by St. Luke in the Paſſage before us.

1747, Gilbert West, Observations on the History and Evidences of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, 3rd edition, London: Printed for R. Dodsley, page 59

The advent of Darnley, and the termination of the Queen’s six years’ widowhood by her union with the “lady-faced long lad,” freed the Maries from their word. Within eighteen months of that event three of the four had entered the ranks of matronage. The first to leave the virgin sisterhood was Mary Livingstone, who, aided by a dowry from the Queen of land worth £500 a year, married John, a younger son of Lord Sempill. A few months later Mary Beton married Alexander Ogilvie, Laird of Boyne; and, early in the following year, Mary Fleming made the most surprising of matches, becoming the wife of the Secretary of State, Maitland of Lethington, who was neither noble nor rich, and was twenty years older than his bride. / So, of “the Queen’s Maries,” Mary Seton alone remained single.

1888, Florence Fenwick-Miller, “A Woman’s Friendship. Mary Stuart and Mary Seton”, in Oscar Wilde, editor, The Woman’s World, London, Paris, New York & Melbourne: Cassell & Company, page 559

According to an ancient legend, after Jesus’ death, the three Maries—Mary Magdalen, Mary Kleophae, and Mary Salome—with their Egyptian servant Sara la Kali, were pushed by the Jews into the sea on a rudderless boat. Friendly currents guided the boat to the beach of Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, and ever since then, the legend tells, this little fishing village has been a place of worship for the three Maries. However, it is not the three Maries, but their black servant Sara la Kali, who is the patron saint of the gypsies.

2005, Sabine Lucas, “Part I. Journey into the Otherworld”, “Chapter 2. Past Lives from a Past Life Reading: Women on the Fringe”, in Bloodlines of the Soul: Karmic Patterns in Past Life Dreams, iUniverse, “Visit to Saintes-Maries-De-La-Mer, page 35