Maria (given name) is a given name, usually for a female, but occasionally male.

Maria or María may also refer to:

In German, von [fɔn] is a preposition which approximately means of or from.

When it is used as a part of a German family name, it is usually a nobiliary particle, like the French, Galician, Spanish and Portuguese de. At certain times and places, it has been illegal for anyone who was not a member of the nobility to use von before their family name. However, in the Middle Ages the von particle was still a common part of names and was widely used also by commoners, e.g. "Hans von Duisburg" meant Hans from [the city of] Duisburg. The Dutch van, which is a cognate of von but does not indicate nobility, can be said to have preserved this earlier meaning.

The abolition of the monarchies in Germany and Austria in 1919 meant that neither state had a privileged nobility, and both had exclusively republican governments.

In Germany, this meant that in principle von simply became an ordinary part of the names of the people who used it. There were no longer any legal privileges or constraints associated with this naming convention. According to German alphabetical sorting people with von in their surnames – of noble or non-noble descent alike – are listed in telephone books and other files, under the rest of their name (e.g. Ludwig von Mises would be under M in the phone book rather than V).

Ritchie as a name is a surname, and may also occur as a given name or diminutive. It may refer to: