2013-04-16 10:05:26 +02:00

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# Telegraph style book: Mm
![Telegraph Style Book][1]
Image 1 of 2
Telegraph Style Book
![Telegraph Style Book][1]
Image 1 of 2
Telegraph Style Book
10:32AM BST 12 Apr 2008
**[A][2]** | **[B][3]** | **[C][4]** | **[D][5]** | **[E][6]** | **[F][7]** |
**[G][8]** | **[H][9]** | **[I][10]** | **[J][11]** | **[K][12]** |
**[L][13]** | **[M][14]** | **[N][15]** | **[O][16]** | **[P][17]** |
**[Q][18]** | **[R][19]** | **[S][20]** | **[T][21]** | **[U][22]** |
**[V][23]** | **[W][24]** | **[X][25]** | **[Y][26]** | **[Z][27]**
* [Telegraph style book: introduction][28]
Maasai, not Masai
Maastricht treaty, thus.
mad cow disease: all l/c. (See legionnaires' disease).
Madama Butterfly is what Puccini wrote.
## Related Articles
* [Introduction][28]
10 Jan 2008
Madison Square Garden, singular.
madrassah.
Magna Carta was sealed, not signed.
maharaja.
Magdalen College Oxford: Magdalene College Cambridge.
maitre d', maitres d': note accent.
major: usually means no more than "big".
majority/minority take a plural verb. See number.
Malkovich, John
Maltesers
Man Booker Prize for Fiction, the
mansion: tabloid. Its use by us can only be satirical.
mantel (shelf). Mantle is a cape.
Marks & Spencer
marry: do not use wed.
marshal always has one l, whether a verb, noun or a title.
Martini & Rossi is a trade name. References specifically to their vermouth
should be capped, the cocktail, which they did not invent, is simply a martini
(three parts gin or vodka to one part dry vermouth, olive and a twist of
lemon).
Martin?, Bohuslav:
Mary Celeste
Mass (cap "M") but high Mass etc etc.
massacre requires many dead, not merely a handful.
masterful (overwhelming), masterly (skilled).
Mathews, Meg
MaxMara
May balls happen in June, at Cambridge.
mayor: John Smith, Mayor of Somevill but later the mayor (lower case).
Mbeki, Thabo
Macaulay, Sarah: Mrs Gordon Brown.
Macavity
Macbeth
MacKenzie, Kelvin
Mackintosh, Sir Cameron
MacLaine, Shirley
Maclean, Donald
Maclean, Alistair
Macleod, Iain
Macmillan, Harold
Macpherson, Elle
Macpherson Report on Stephen Lawrence.
McCain, John
McCartney, Sir Paul. His second wife is never "Lady Heather".
McDonald's
McDonald, Sir Trevor
McGregor, Ewan
McGuinness, Martin
McKellen, Sir Ian
McLaren, racing team.
McQueen, Alexander
Meat Loaf
Mecca: given this is Mohammed's birthplace, to describe somewhere like a
nightclub as "a mecca for young people" risks causing grave offence to our
Muslim readers.
medals: The Victoria Cross is the highest military honour for bravery. The
civilian equivalent is the George Cross, which is followed by the George
Medal.
media is a plural word which should be used only when newspapers, radio,
television, press, broadcasting organisations and other precise terms are
inaccurate or consume too much space in, say, an intro.
Medicins Sans Frontieres
medieval.
Medvedev, Dmitry
meet with is an abomination. See pointless prepositions.
Merchant Navy is capped in titles only, otherwise lower case.
merge with something, not into it.
Merkel, Angela
Messiah: Handel's oratorio does not take the handle "the".
meteoric rise: As well as being over-used, this is a bit silly when you
consider what meteors do, i.e. hurtle towards Earth.
metrication: not metrification.
Michaeljohn: smart hairdresser.
Michelangelo
Mickey Mouse
micro light: not microlite.
Middle East: Mideast only in headlines (See Places and Peoples). Middle West
or Midwest.
mileage
militate is not to be confused with mitigate: the former means actively to
counter something, the latter to moderate or make something less severe.
Millennium
million: In the business pages abbreviate to m, elsewhere in the paper always
write out in full.
minuscule is to be spelt correctly on the rare occasions when we need to refer
to an early cursive script or small type, and on the rarer occasions when it
can properly be used instead of small, tiny or minute.
Milosevic, Slobodan
miracles: biblical use only.
miss: the plural of this honorific is misses. So it is the Misses Smith, not
the Miss Smiths.
Mitterrand, François
mixed metaphors: be alert for these, such as "fuelling a backlash".
Mobutu, Sese Seko
moderator (of a church) takes a capital in titles but later is lower case.
mogul for Indian and other (e.g. film) references, otherwise Mongol. money:
see Numbers file. For decimal denominations, place the point at the bottom,
i.e. £14.95.
Moet et Chandon
Mohammed is the Prophet, and use in all other contexts unless a variant is
established in a personal name.
Mongol, in references to children suffering from Down's syndrome, offends.
Monroe, Marilyn
Moorfields
more than: much preferred to "over", so avoid "over 60 people".
morphed: never except in a strictly technical sense as a computer-generated
special effect. Use "metamorphosed" in all other contexts.
Morrissey, Neil
mortgagee is the institution from which a mortgage is obtained: the person who
takes it out is the mortgagor.
Mosimann, Anton
mother of parliaments: never use to describe the parliament at Westminster.
The phrase from which this much-misquoted line is taken is "England is the
mother of parliaments".
motorcycle, motorcyclist.
MRSA: if this has to be written out in full it is methicillin resistant
Staphylococcus aureus.
MS and MSS for manuscript and manuscripts.
Mubarak, Hosni: President of Egypt
Muhammad Ali
Mujahideen
multiculturalism
multiples: say "three times as many", not "three times more than". Never say
"three times less than": you mean "one third of".
mum and dad are banned: mother and father is the right tone.
Murdoch, Elisabeth
Musharraf, Pervez, is now a President, not a General.
Muslim, not Moslem.
mutual, meaning common to two or more parties (Our Mutual Friend) should not
be used unless the word common would be misleading or ambiguous.
Myriad, originally the Greek word for 10,000, requires no of: i.e., there are
myriad people.
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