Meanings
plural Mary-buds
- obsoleteA marigold or its blossom.
And winking Mary-buds begin / To ope their golden eyes: / With every thing that pretty is, / My lady sweet, arise.
1611 April (first recorded performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Cymbeline”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii], lines 23-261 more example
The garden lay below me, and the dewy meadows beyond. In the one, bees were busy ruffling the ruddy gillyflowers and April stocks; in the other, the hedge twigs were all frosted with Mary buds, as if Spring had brushed them with the fleece of her wings in passing.
1899, Bernard Capes, At a Winter's Fire
Cite this entry
Mary-bud. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Mary-bud
“Mary-bud.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Mary-bud. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “Mary-bud,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Mary-bud.
Source: Mary-bud on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.