Word.ws English Dictionary

ms

/ɛmz//ˈmɪz/

ms is the abbreviation of manuscript.

ms is the plural of m.

Meaning of manuscript

Noun

manuscript (plural manuscripts)

  1. A book, composition or any other document, written by hand (or manually typewritten), not mechanically reproduced.
    • We read in history, that the beauty of an ancient manuscript tempted King Alfred, when a boy at his mother's knee, to learn the letters of the Saxon tongue.1845, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “Anglo-Saxon Language and Poetry”, in The Poets and Poetry of Europe. […], Philadelphia, Pa.: Carey and Hart, […], →OCLC, page 1, column 1
  2. A single, original copy of a book, article, composition etc, written by hand or even printed, submitted as original for (copy-editing and) reproductive publication.

See all 3 meanings of manuscript

Meaning of m

Noun

m (plural ms)

  1. (obsolete) thousand
    • Having made a divorce with politics as I have already mentioned I have only to trouble you on my personal affairs ... —The principle & most pressing is that of the 9. m. dollars1798 Letter from William Short to Thomas Jefferson

See all 10 meanings of m

Noun (1) capitalized: MS

MS (countable and uncountable, plural MSes)

  1. (abbreviation, plural MSS) Abbreviation of manuscript.
  2. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of mint state, a grading term.
  3. M/S: Initialism of motor ship.
  4. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of morphine sulfate.
  5. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of mitral stenosis.
  6. (abbreviation, initialism, uncountable) Initialism of multiple sclerosis.
  7. (abbreviation, initialism, academics) Initialism of Master of Science.
  8. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of middle school.
  9. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of mini-sheet.
  10. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of murder-suicide.
  11. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of medium shot.
  12. (UK, abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of member of Senedd

Proper noun capitalized: MS

MS

  1. (abbreviation) Abbreviation of Mato Grosso do Sul: a state of Brazil.
  2. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of Microsoft: an American multinational technology company founded in 1975.
  3. (abbreviation) Abbreviation of Mississippi: a state of the United States.
  4. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of Morgan Stanley.
    • According to a list of participants on the forum’s website, the CEOs of Goldman Sachs (GS) and Morgan Stanley (MS) still plan to go. Both banks declined to comment. But a person familiar with the situation said Goldman’s Lloyd Blankfein was “unlikely to attend.”2014 May 2, Mark Thompson and Aaron Smith, “U.S. presses CEOs to skip Russia’s Davos”, in CNN Business

Noun (2) capitalized: Ms

Ms (plural Mss or Mses)

  1. Title used before an adult woman's name or surname, especially when it is not desired or possible to indicate her marital status with Miss or Mrs.
    • Ms Jane Doe; Ms. Roe
    • ‘[…] I don’t know how to thank you for this, Mrs Stevenson.’ ‘It’s Ms to my business associates and Anna to you,’ […]1995, Stephen King, “The Kindness of Strangers”, in Rose Madder, London: BCA [Book Club Associates], →OCLC, section 7, page 55
  2. Title used for a woman before a place, name, thing, or description that she is supposed to typify or represent.
    • Ms Efficiency and Ms Right
    Synonyms:
    Mrs.

Noun (3) capitalized: Ms

Ms

  1. (plural) plural of M

Noun (4) capitalized: Ms

Ms (uncountable)

  1. (abbreviation) Abbreviation of mesyl.

Synonyms of ms

Forms of ms

pluralmss
alternative formms.
alternative formm's
pluralMSes
pluralMss
pluralMses
alternative formMs.
alternative formM/s
alternative formM's

Origin of ms

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Found since the 1600s as an abbreviation of mistress (whence also Miss and Mrs), a title which initially did not indicate marital status. Suggestions that the term be revived began in 1901, and referenced the fact that dialects such as Southern US English already made no distinction between Miss and Mrs (/ˈmɪz/) in speech. With the founding of the magazine Ms. in 1971, the term quickly became widespread as an alternative to Miss and Mrs., which require knowing (and publicizing) the referent's marital status.

From a shortening of its name.

Words formed from ms

Phrases with ms

Words that rhyme with ms

Questions about ms

What does ms mean?
Ms means m/S: Initialism of motor ship.
What is ms the abbreviation of?
Ms is the abbreviation of manuscript.
What part of speech is ms?
Ms can be a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce ms?
Ms is pronounced /ɛmz/.
What is the plural of ms?
The plural of ms is mss.

Words near ms in the dictionary

  1. MRVs
  2. mrw
  3. MRWs
  4. MRZ
  5. MRZs
  6. ms
  7. MS Contin
  8. Ms President
  9. Ms Presidents
  10. Ms Right
  11. Ms Rights

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: ms (page history and authors); MS (page history and authors); Ms (page history and authors); manuscript (page history and authors); m (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Persent101-ms.wav.

Cite this entry: “ms.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/ms. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.