# may

Pronunciation: say "MAY" /meɪ/

## Verb

1. Used to say that something is possible, or that it is perhaps true.
   - Simple: Used to say that something is possible or could be true.
   - _Symptoms may appear several days after exposure._
   - _Some of the information on this page may be out of date._
3. To be allowed to; used in giving permission and in polite requests, offers and remarks.
   - Simple: Used to say someone is allowed to do something, or to ask or say something politely.
   - _Students may use a calculator on the second half of the exam._
   - _May I see your ticket, please?_
4. Used to grant that something is true while contrasting it with another statement, usually one introduced by but.
   - Simple: Used to admit that one thing is true before adding a point that goes against it.
   - _The hotel may be expensive, but the view from every room is worth it._
   - _Prices may have fallen this month, but most families are still struggling to pay their bills._
5. Used to express a wish that something will happen or be so, with the force of a present subjunctive.
   - Simple: Used to make a wish, to say you hope something will happen.
   - _Long may the old theater keep its doors open._
   - _We pray that the rains may come before the crops fail._
10. To go maying: to gather hawthorn blossom or other flowers and join in May Day celebrations. *(literary)*
   - Simple: To pick spring flowers and celebrate May Day, an old village custom.
   - _The village children went maying in the meadows and came back with armfuls of hawthorn for the church._
   - _Couples wandered maying along the hedgerows, filling their baskets with blossom._

## Proper noun · May

2. The fifth month of the Gregorian calendar, coming after April and before June.
   - Simple: The fifth month of the year, after April and before June.
   - _The conference will be held on May 14 in Chicago._
   - _After a wet May, the farmers were glad to see a dry June._

## Noun

7. The hawthorn shrub, or the blossoms it produces.
   - Simple: The hawthorn bush, or the flowers that grow on it.
   - _The may is in full bloom along the hedgerows this week._
   - _Bees hummed in the may at the edge of the field._

## Verb

6. To be able to do something; can. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: An old way of saying 'can' or 'be able to'.
8. To be strong, or to have power over someone or something. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: To be strong, or to have power over something.

## Noun

9. A maiden, a young woman who is not yet married. *(archaic)*
   - Simple: A young woman or girl who is not married.

## Origin

**Meaning 2** — Maia, a Roman earth goddess, gave her name to Latin Maius ("Maia's month"). That became Old French mai and then Middle English May or Mai.
**Meanings 7, 10** — The shrub is named for the month of May, when it blossoms, and English took the word from French mai.
**Meaning 9** — Proto-Germanic *mēgaz ("kinsman") and Proto-West Germanic *māg lie behind Old English mǣġ ("kinswoman"). In Middle English it became may or maye, meaning "woman, maid, girl, virgin".
**Meanings 1, 3–6, 8** — From Old English mæġ, a present-tense form of magan ("to be able, to have power"), through Middle English may; German mögen is related, and might is its past form.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/may (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).