Marches

Marches is ambiguous. It can be:

• the third person singular inflection of the verb 'to march': a soldier marches
• a unit [e.g. of time] connected with the above verb, for example 'Rome lay three marches away'. A forced march is a military march carried out under pressure of greater speed or distance, or both, than normal
• a geographical or political designation of an area, meaning 'borderland'.
  • In Britain, the Marches is usually the lands lying between England and Wales, nowadays most often applied to Shropshire. A marcher lord was a magnate responsible for the border. A territorial title for such was Marquis (feminine Marquess, which is to March as Count is to county
    • Before the Act of Union 1707, the - often lawless - border between England and Scotland was divided into three Marches for each country, the East March, West March and Middle March. Wardens were appointed for each of these to govern and control the Border.

The title of George Eliot's novel Middlemarch has only an incidental connection with the central wards on the Border.

• • The name March, or its equivalent (usually cognate) in other languages, is common internationally.

• • Some obsolete

obsolete 'wild celery'; also 'spoor of an otter'; part of a loom

plural of month