U.S. state; the word is plural, originally (1614) a name for the Algonquian native people who lived around the bay, from Algonquian Massachusett "at the large hill," in reference to Great Blue Hill, southwest of Boston. Related: Massachusettensian.
originally M.I.T., abbreviation of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, attested from 1892. The school was founded 1861.
island off Massachusetts, early forms include Natocke, Nantican, Nautican; from an obscure southern New England Algonquian word, perhaps meaning "in the middle of waters." Its identity as a summer resort for the wealthy dates to 1950s. Related: Nantucketer.
U.S. name for a variety of pear, 1835, named for Enoch Bartlett, who first distributed them in the U.S. The quotation collection is named for U.S. bookstore owner John Bartlett of Cambridge, Massachusetts, who first printed his "A Collection of Familiar Quotations" in 1855.