maisonn.

c1540 Image Ipocrysy ii, in J. Skelton Poet. Wks. (1843) II. 423/1 [A bishop ought] To spende in tyme and season, And so to kepe his meason.

1570 in J. Cranstoun Satirical Poems Reformation (1891) I. x. 412 With all foull vice thou hes defylde yair Maisoun.

1578 J. Rolland Seuin Seages 14 I thocht appeird: That the ruif tre of all this haill Maissoun, Vnto the eird was quyte declynit doun.

a1598 D. Fergusson Sc. Prov. (1641) sig. E^v Provision in season, makes a rich meason.

a1625 J. Sempill Picktooth for Pope in Harp Renfrew (1873) 2nd Ser. 19 I can but..seek my meat through many an unknown Maison.

1909 Manch. Guardian 24 Nov. 10/1 Dresses by the ‘Maison N'Importe’ and all the rest of it.

1932 ‘E. M. Delafield’ Thank Heaven Fasting i. ii. 32 The tall, yellow-headed assistant from the Maison Leroy in Sloane Street..twisted the hot irons in and out of her hair.

1935 A. Christie Death in Clouds xiii. 138 I'll easily get what I want from Henri's or the Maison Richet.

1966 J. Stevens Cox Illustr. Dict. Hairdressing & Wigmaking 94 Maison... A mode of address used by many fashionable hairdressers of the Victorian and Edwardian periods... The intention was to convey to the public that the firm had a knowledge of French hair styles... An example was Maison Stephens et Cie., Queen's Road, Clifton.

1970 ‘J. Bonett’ & ‘E. Bonett’ Sound of Murder ix. 112 In gold letters on a heart-shaped label were the words ‘Maison Petronelle—Nail Lacquer’.

1993 Oxf. & District Phone Bk. 288/2 Maison Gay of Didcot, Ladies Hrdrsr.

1939 E. Ambler Mask of Dimitrios vii. 126 Your maison close must have proved disappointing. The inevitable Armenian girls, of course.

1961 Guardian 10 Feb. 9/4 Toulouse-Lautrec..became..an inhabitant of the Maisons Closes where the girls regarded him as an amiable..mascot.

1992 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 16 July 31/4 Parent-Duschâtelet's system outlawed such licentious practices, replacing them with a network of meticulously surveyed maisons de tolérance (also referred to as maisons closes).

1930 G. Greene Name of Action i. i. 12 A maison de convenance... They do these things better in Paris.

1966 Punch 16 Feb. 245/1 A respectable businessman..turns out to be the spitting image of the hall porter at a notorious maison de convenance.

1985 J. Marsh Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood iii. 58 Holman's..new picture, showing a kept woman in a maison de convenance.

1927 E. Hemingway in Scribner's Mag. Apr. 359/2 The American lady had bought her own clothes for twenty years now from the same maison de couturier [sic] in the Rue Saint Honoré.]

1933 A. Christie Lord Edgware Dies xii. 107 The name of Lao Tse would suggest to her a prize Pekingese dog, the name of Molière a maison de couture.

1964 A. Adburgham Shops & Shopping xxi. 247 Paul Poiret..described..a visit paid to his maison de couture by Margot Asquith.

1970 S. J. Perelman Baby, it's Cold Inside 53 The rigors of squiring her through a score of maisons de couture, jewelers', and millinery shops were..unimaginable.

1963 Times 22 Feb. 11/5 Last summer M. Vilar hinted to Le Monde that he would leave the T.N.P. unless the Government revised its financial support of the theatre. It is believed that M. Vilar will take over a maison de culture in the northern Paris suburbs which comprises a local theatre and an acting school.

1994 Gazette (Montreal) 3 Sept. h5/4 The more community-centred function played by the city-run Maisons de la Culture..and the like.

1960 B. Marshall Divided Lady xxix. 99 The hotel we drew up at eventually reminded me of a maison-de-passe I used to know in Barcelona.

1967 L. Deighton Expensive Place x. 71 It's not a brothel... It's a maison de passe. It's a house that people go to when they already have a girl with them.

1991 J. Richardson Life of Picasso I. xi. 160 The hotel was probably a maison de passe.

1843 E. A. Poe Murders in Rue Morgue in Prose Romances 32 Some raving maniac, escaped from a neighbouring Maison de Santé.

1859 Times 5 Feb. 5/6 (advt.) Maison de Santé, or Residence for Invalids.

1910 W. J. Locke Simon the Jester xxiv. 337 He seemed to be happy enough at the maison de santé.

1940 J. Joyce Let. 3 Nov. (1966) III. 496 I had arranged for the reception at a Swiss maison de santé.

1942 ‘A. Bridge’ Frontier Passage vii. 125 We don't want him shut up in a maison de santé for spy mania.

1852 Reynold's Newspaper 9 May 6/4 Thence they were taken direct to a maison de tolerance (semi-brothel) in Bordeaux.

1940 Amer. Jrnl. Internat. Law 34 455 Forced to leave [Iraq] because of bad conduct, he went to India. Banished from there, he fled to Paris where he was employed in a maison de la tolérance.

1992 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 16 July 31/4 Parent-Duschâtelet's system outlawed such licentious practices, replacing them with a network of meticulously surveyed maisons de tolérance.

1897 E. Dowson Let. 11 June (1967) 386 I propose to take a maison meublée for a year.

1920 J. Joyce Let. 10 Nov. (1966) III. 29 As I could not find any flat in Paris we are staying in this maison meublée.

1986 D. Arkell Alain-Fournier vii. 119 The place was not a pension de famille, as sometimes described, but a maison meublée run by a Mme Mahieu.

1893 G. B. Shaw Let. 12 Dec. (1965) I. 412 A woman of bad character, proprietress of two maisons tolérées in Brussels.

1927 Observer 11 Dec. 20/2 Agreement on that point [sc. that abolition of the licensed houses of prostitution decreases the white slave traffic] greatly strengthens the hands of the League in working for the abolition of the maison tolérée.

1970 K. Chesney Victorian Underworld x. 343 Conditioned by her existence in a maison tolérée,..she was very much in the hands of the bawd to whom she was consigned.