Frances
Pronunciation
  • (British, America) IPA: /ˈfɹænsɪz/
  • (RP) IPA: /ˈfɹɑːnsɪz/
Proper noun
  1. A female given name, feminine form of Francis.
    • c.1590 William Shakespeare: Love's Labour's Lost: Act III, Scene I:
      Armado. Sirrah Costard, I will enfranchise thee.
      Costard. O! marry me to one Frances: I smell some l'envoy, some goose, in this.
    • 1883 Wilkie Collins, Heart and Science, Chatto and Windus, page 227:
      "My name is Frances. Don't call me Fanny!" "Why not?" "Because it's too absurd to be endured! What does the mere sound of Fanny suggest? A flirting dancing creature - plump and fair, and playful and pretty! - - - Call me Frances - a man's name, with only the difference between an i and an e. No sentiment in it, hard, like me."
    • 1961 Janet Frame, Owls Do Cry, ISBN 072510029X, page 97:
      My other sisters had interesting names. There was Francie, that was Frances, and though she wore slacks and my father seemed angry with her, I thought she was some relation to Saint Francis, who, I believed, kept animals in his pocket and took them out and licked them, the way Francie licked a blackball or acid drop, for pure love.
Related terms Translations Proper noun
  1. plural form of France
    • 1967, Eric A. Nordlinger, The Working-class Tories, page 236:
      The malaise of French politics has commonly been interpreted as a product of a deep-seated conflict between the ‘two Frances’.
    • 2013, Making Sense of the Secular: Critical Perspectives ISBN 1136277218, page 48:
      Was it the end of the long conflict between the two Frances? Yes and no.



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