Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Used as a disparaging term for a Converso.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun historical Any of the Sephardi Jews who stayed in Iberia during the Spanish Inquisition, and continued to practice Judaism in secret.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun (medieval Spain and Portugal) a disparaging term for a Jew who converted to Christianity in order to avoid persecution but continued to practice their religion secretly

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Spanish, pig, Marrano (from the Jewish prohibition against eating pork), probably from Arabic maḥram, something forbidden, from ḥarama, to forbid; see x̣rm in Semitic roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Spanish marrano, of disputed origin. Perhaps a transferred use of marrano ("hog"), but many sources consider them distinct words.

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Examples

  • Maraniss comes from Marrano, which is a word that was given to Spanish Jews during the Inquisition, conversos.

    First in His Class: A Biography of Bill Clinton 1995

  • Marrano, which is behind the Cibo Palace, near the houses of the

    Lives of the most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects Vol. 06 (of 10) Fra Giocondo to Niccolo Soggi Giorgio Vasari 1542

  • He was declared a Marrano, a Jew who had only pretended to embrace the One True Faith.

    Crusade Nancy Holder 2010

  • But Sarah, while no longer a Christian in spirit, is not yet a Jew: she has become a Marrano, an exiled Jew under cover running away from Paris twenty years ago to try and discover who she is.

    Mich��le Sarde. 2009

  • Cut off from the Jewish world outside Portugal, with education and worship rendered dangerous by the presence of the Inquisition, Marrano faith became diluted and diverged from Jewish tradition.

    well i don't know if i'm wrong because she's only just gone melissima 2007

  • In late 1594, Elizabeth I's personal physician -- and one of Burghley's highest-placed intelligencers -- a Portugese Marrano (a crypto-Jew) by the name of Roderigo or Roderick or Roger Lopez or Lopus or Lopius, was executed at Tyburn for plotting to murder the queen.

    well i don't know if i'm wrong because she's only just gone melissima 2007

  • A fully fledged Marrano represents as much a taxonomicl challenge to the historian as the duck-billed platypus did to a Victorian naturalist.

    well i don't know if i'm wrong because she's only just gone melissima 2007

  • Death of Don Joseph Nasi, a wealthy Jewish businessman (born as a Marrano in Portugal) who moved to Istanbul from Europe in 1554 and gained much influence by financing the rise to power of Selim II.

    c. 1570 2001

  • During his four years in Montpellier, Platter lodged with a Marrano family, Spanish Jews forcibly converted to Christianity.

    Savoring The Past Wheaton Barbara Ketcham 1983

  • During his four years in Montpellier, Platter lodged with a Marrano family, Spanish Jews forcibly converted to Christianity.

    Savoring The Past Wheaton Barbara Ketcham 1983

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