bertha

plural berthas

1. A lace collar that covers the shoulders of a dress

1. A female given name from the Germanic languages.

   Why couldn't they have called her by her first name, Bertha, which was beautiful and dignified, instead of that silly "Rilla"?

   1921, Lucy Maud Montgomery, Rilla of Ingleside, Echo Library, published 2006, →ISBN, page 12

   2 more examples

   You are the beautiful Bertha, the spinner, the queen of Helvetia; / She whose story I read at a stall in the streets of Southampton

   1858, Henry Wadswoth Longfellow, The Courtship of Miles Standish

   "No wonder she never gets anywhere with a name like Bertha," Sally said, while having coffee afterwards with two of the other night-coursers. "It goes with her outfits, though." ( Bertha sports the macrame look, with health-food sandals and hand-weave skirts that don't do a thing for her square figure, [...])

   1983, Margaret Atwood, Bluebeard's Egg, McCleland-Bantam, →ISBN, page 135

2. alternativeAlternative form of Perchta (“goddess in Alpine paganism”).