... After the captivity, Miriam took the Greek forms of Mariam and Mariamne, and became very frequent among Jewish women, probably in the expectation of the new deliverance from the bondage that galled them like that of Egypt of old.  It was the name of the Asmonean princess in whom the brave Maccabean line was extinguished by Herod the Great; it belonged to three if not to four of the women of the Gospel; and we find it again marking the miserable being who is cited as having fulfilled the most terrible of all the woes denounced by Moses upon the daughters of Jerusalem.
    The name of Mariam continued in the East, but was very slow in creeping into the Western Church, though not only the Blessed Virgin herself had borne it, but two very popular saints, namely, the Magdalen, and the Penitent of Egypt, whose legends were both current at a very early period. (History of Christian Names, Yonge, 1884)