Alice

Etymology

From Old French Alis, Alice, from Old High German Adalheidis, from adal (“noble”) + heit (“kind, sort”). Doublet of Adelaide.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈæl.ɪs/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Proper noun

Alice

1. A female given name popular in England since the Middle Ages.
   • 1380s-1390s, Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales: The Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale:

     That Iankin clerk, and my gossib dame Alis, / And I my-self, in-to the feldes wente.

   • 1871 Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There, Chapter 6:

     "My name is Alice, but - "

     "It's a stupid name enough!" Humpty Dumpty interrupted impatiently. "What does it mean?"

     "Must a name mean something?" Alice asked doubtfully.

     "Of course it must," Humpty Dumpty said with a short laugh, "my name means the shape I am - and a good handsome shape it is, too. With a name like yours, you might be any shape, almost."

   • 1968 Kurt Vonnegut, Welcome to the Monkey House, Delacorte Press, page xiv:

     She was heavenly to look at, and graceful, both in and out of water. She was a sculptress. She was christened 'Alice', but she used to deny that she was really an Alice. I agreed. Everybody agreed. Sometime in a dream maybe I will find out what her real name was.

2. (cryptography, physics) a placeholder name for the person or system that sends a message to another person or system conventionally known as Bob.
3. (Australia, slang, often with "the") Alice Springs, Australia.
   • 2002, Sylvia Lawson, Budgerigars, and Positions of Ignorance, in How Simone de Beauvoir died in Australia: stories and essays, page 17,

     At that point in my second visit to the Alice, I'd been there only a day. […] they're doing Australia in two weeks, with a few days each for Sydney, the Alice and the Rock, Kakadu and Cairns.

   • 2003, Janet Judy McIntyre-Mills, quoting Olive Veverbrants, Critical systemic praxis for social and environmental justice (page 27),

     In 1892 my Chinese grandfather lived in Alice.

   • 2004, Larry Habegger, Travelers' Tales Australia: True Stories (page 7),

     "Don't waste yer time in The Alice, get out and see the country — that's what yer 'ere for."

4. A city in North Dakota.
5. A city in and the county seat of Jim Wells County, Texas.

See also

• Alice and Bob
• Bob

Further reading

• Alice (given name) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Alice and Bob on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Alice Springs on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Alice, North Dakota on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Alice, Texas on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• Alcie, Celia, Licea, ileac

Etymology

From English Alice, from Old French Alis, Alice, from Old High German Adalheidis, from adal (“noble”) + heit (“kind, sort”).

Proper noun

Alice

1. a female given name
2. the titular character of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Proper noun

Alice f

1. A female given name, cognate to Alice.

Proper noun

Alice

1. A female given name borrowed from English.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /a.lis/

• Audio

  (file)

Proper noun

Alice f

1. A female given name of Germanic origin.

Anagrams

• celai
• Célia

Pronunciation

• (Standard Northern) IPA^(key): /aˈliː.sə/, [ʔaˈliː.sə]
• (Austrian German) IPA^(key): /aˈliːs/
• Hyphenation: A‧li‧ce

Proper noun

Alice

1. A female given name borrowed from English; cognate to modern German Adelheid.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /aˈliːtʃe/, [äˈliːt͡ʃe]

Proper noun

Alice f

1. A female given name, equivalent to English Alice.

Anagrams

• acile
• celai
• celia
• elica

Proper noun

Alice

1. A female given name borrowed from English.

Pronunciation

• (Portugual) IPA^(key): /ɐ.ˈli.sɨ/
• (Brazil) IPA^(key): /a.ˈli.si/

Proper noun

Alice f

1. A female given name, equivalent to English Alice
2. (cryptography) Alice (entity sending a message)

Etymology

From English Alice. First recorded as a given name in Sweden in 1841.

Proper noun

Alice c (genitive Alices)

1. A female given name.

References

• Roland Otterbjörk: Svenska förnamn, Almqvist & Wiksell 1996, →ISBN
• Statistiska centralbyrån and Sture Allén, Staffan Wåhlin, Förnamnsboken, Norstedts 1995, →ISBN: 32 481 females with the given name Alice living in Sweden on December 31st, 2010, with frequency peaks in the 19th century and in the 2000s decade. Accessed on 19 June 2011.