a person whose trade is building with units of various natural or artificial mineral products, as stones, bricks, cinder blocks, or tiles, usually with the use of mortar or cement as a bonding agent.
a person who dresses stones or bricks.
(initial capital letter) a Freemason.
Bobbie Ann, born 1940, U.S. short-story writer and novelist.
Charles, 1730–87, English astronomer and surveyor.
George, 1725–92, American statesman.
Lowell, 1792–1872, U.S. hymnist and educator.
Dame Sandra Prunella, born 1949, Barbadian politician: 1st president of Barbados since 2021.
a male given name.
a person skilled in building with stone
a person who dresses stone
First recorded in 1175–1225; Middle English machun, mason, from Old French machun, masson, from Frankish makjon (unrecorded) “maker,” derivative of makōn “to make”; see make 1
If you spent the summer building a beautiful stone wall around your backyard, you may have a future as a mason, someone who builds things out of brick or stone. Usage experts can’t quite agree on the origins of the word mason. Some believe that it traces back to the German word mahhon, meaning "to make." True or not, it’s a good way to remember the meaning of mason: masons make things out of brick or stone. A mason is a skilled craftsperson who might, for example, carve stone for a memorial or do work on the brick walls of a house.
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Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Dr Lindsay said a stone mason who visited the dig suggested the slabs' smooth surfaces were the result of people walking on them over many years.
From BBC ● Oct. 11, 2026
Every spring, mason Mohammad Ghulam Sarwar boards a train to Indian Kashmir, seeking higher wages despite the risk of being targeted by militants in the disputed Himalayan region.
From Barron's ● Sep. 14, 2026
We see how the form of a finial was generated by the progressive subdivision of a square, precisely the same process by which the mason would incise and cut his stone.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 27, 2026
It’s a high-tech twist on the classic mason jar, using a silicone lid with a degassing valve and an AirGone Argon Gas Canister to flush out oxygen.
From Salon ● Apr. 18, 2025
Some jars are simple glass mason jars, others are glazed ceramic jars or ornate frosted glass.
From "The Night Circus" by Erin Morgenstern
Mr. Kashdan is a psychology professor and founder of the Well-Being Laboratory at George Mason University.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 15, 2026
Dr Ursula Mason, chair of the Royal College of General Practitioners Northern Ireland, said finding a substitute "can cause real anxiety for patients".
From BBC ● Oct. 14, 2026
He mentioned Jones by name during a January 2024 rally in Mason City, Iowa.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 12, 2026
Mason said that last year "it was about £300 to fill up - it is horrendous".
From BBC ● Oct. 12, 2026
Mr. Mason walked over to the counter then, and when he saw Beto, his face seemed to change, to go stiff somehow, and he smiled.
From "Out of Darkness" by Ashley Hope Pérez
All these tasks required master craftsmen, masons, architects and artists.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 14, 2026
Kajal's brothers worked as masons in Moradabad town.
From BBC ● Feb. 3, 2026
Finding enough skilled masons was the group’s first challenge.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 18, 2025
Last summer, the first five women graduated from that state’s program, a partnership between the corrections department and the ironworkers, bricklayers and cement masons unions, which offer direct or preferred entry to graduates.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 14, 2024
There were tradesmen, traders, tinkers, masons, and carpenters, hauling goods of one kind or another.
From "Crispin: The Cross of Lead" by Avi
Marlowe of masoned clouds, and Marston, in his better moments, of the fragmentary vigour of a Roman ruin,’ one begins to regret that any one ever thought of the unity of the arts.
From Reviews by Oscar Wilde
Flask Walk, which leads out of the high street among old houses and greeneries, brings us to the shadowy Well Walk, with its overarching trees and with many living memories masoned into its dead walls.
From A Literary Pilgrimage Among the Haunts of Famous British Authors by Theodore F. (Theodore Frelinghuysen) Wolfe
So the King’s daughter sat in her vaulted chamber in the masoned house, and she thought upon the thought.
From Fables by Robert Louis Stevenson
The material was a grayish stone, rudely cut and masoned into walls of surprising thickness and strength; along two of which walls—the side ones—were distributed as many rows of arched and stately windows.
From Pierre; or The Ambiguities by Herman Melville
No, no: nor was the Pyramid of Cheops masoned in a month; though, once built, the sands left by the deluge might not have submerged such a pile.
From Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I by Herman Melville
A moment comes, presently, when the harvesting is interrupted and the masoning resumed.
From The Mason-Bees by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos
No matter: the Bee who was masoning will mason.
From The Mason-Bees by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos
She was doing mason's work; and, once on that tack, guided by the unconscious impulse, she has to keep masoning, even though her labour be useless, superfluous and opposed to her interests.
From The Mason-Bees by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos
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