ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1771 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1771 ************************************ From: "Brian M. Scott" 1 Jul 1999 Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel! You asked about <Beatrix le Tuilier> as a French feminine name. You mentioned that you were leaning toward the later SCA period but hadn't actually settled on a particular time. Although the exact spelling <Beatrix le Tuilier> is fairly unlikely at any time during our period, the name can be fitted to any period of French history from the 12th century through the end of the SCA period with only very minor changes in spelling. Here are the details; some of them are fairly technical, so I've summarized the conclusions at the end of each section of the discussion. <Beatrix> is originally a Latin name; it occurs several times in the 10th and 11th centuries in what is now France and was occasionally borrowed into Old French in this form. [1, 2] This form is the nominative case, used, for instance, for the subject of a sentence. The other cases, called the oblique cases, are <Beatricis>, <Beatrici>, <Beatricem>, and <Beatrice>; these are used for direct and indirect objects, possessives (<liber Beatricis> 'Beatrix's book'), and various other grammatical roles. Notice that all of them start <Beatrici-> or <Beatrice->. When the name was borrowed into Old French, is was on these forms that the borrowing was usually based. Latin <c> followed by <i> or <e> came to be pronounced \ts\ in Old French. [3] This sound was written <z>, and as a result we find that <Beatriz> (together with various dialect modifications) is the normal Old French form of the name. In later Old French, starting probably in the 13th century, this final \ts\ sound became a simple \s\ sound and was sometimes written <s>. To add to the confusion, at some point in the Middle Ages the French started using <-x> for earlier <-us>, so that they might write <Diex> instead of <Dieus> 'God'. By the 15th century, in fact, <-x> was used more generally as a popular spelling variant for <-s>. [4, 5] Thus, in early Old French, say of the 12th century, the name would probably have been written something like <Beatriz> and pronounced \BAY-@-treets\. (The \@\ stands for the sound of <a> in <about> and <sofa>.) By the end of the 13th century both <Beatriz> and <Beatris> are likely spellings, both representing the pronunciation \BAY-@-treece\. Throughout this period the original Latin spelling <Beatrix> also occurs, since many records were written in Latin. By the 15th century or probably a bit earlier this spelling need not have been a Latinization but rather could have represented the ordinary vernacular pronunciation, \BAY-@-treece\. Paris tax records of 1292 already include the forms <Beatriz>, <Bietriz>, <Bietris>, and <Bietrix>, though it's not entirely clear what pronunciation is represented by the last of these forms. [6] In short, <Beatrix> is a possible written form of the name at least from the 10th century on, and from perhaps the mid-14th century on it represented the pronunciation \BAY-@-treece\. The byname <le Tuilier> means 'the tile-maker'; it occurs in Paris in 1292 and gave rise to the modern surname <Tuilier> and a number of variants. [6, 7] This form is masculine; the corresponding feminine would have been <la Tuiliere>. [8] We do not know whether this occupation was practised by women, so we can't say whether <la Tuiliere> is particularly plausible as a descriptive, occupational byname for a woman. However, it was not uncommon in medieval France for a woman to use a grammatically feminine form of her husband's byname. [9] <Beatrix la Tuiliere> would be an excellent French name c.1300 meaning either 'Beatrix the tile-maker' or 'Beatrix the tile-maker's wife'. In the 15th and 16th centuries most French surnames were hereditary, just as they are today. Since most of the modern surnames descended from the medieval descriptive byname <le Tuilier> lack the definite article, <Beatrix Tuilier> is probably a likelier late-period form than one containing <le>. However, longer forms did survive, so <Beatrix Letuilier> is certainly a possible late-period name as well. [7, 10] We emphasize, though, that by then <Letuilier> would have been simply an inherited surname, not an occupational description. To sum up: <Beatrix la Tuiliere> would be a very authentic name for the 12th through 14th centuries, and both <Beatrix Tuilier> and <Beatrix Letuilier> would be suitable for the 15th and 16th centuries. Arval Benicoeur and Walraven van Nijmegen also contributed to this letter; we hope that it has been helpful. Please write again if you have any further questions. For the Academy, Talan Gwynek 1 July 1999 ===== References and Notes: [1] Morlet, Marie-The/re\se. Les Noms de Personne sur le Territoire de l'Ancienne Gaule du VIe au XIIe Sie\cle, Vol. II (Paris: E/ditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1972); p.26. [The slash and backslash represent respectively acute and grave accents over the preceding vowels.] [2] Jacobsson, Harry. E/tudes d'Anthroponymie Lorraine les Bans de Tre/fonds de Metz (1267-1298) (Go"teborg: Gumperts Fo"rlag, 1955); p.213. [The slash stands for an acute accent over the preceding vowel; <o"> represents o-umlaut.] [3] Ewert, Alfred. The French Language (London: Faber & Faber Limited, 1953); p.83. [4] Einhorn, E. Old French: A Concise Handbook (London & New York: Cambridge University Press, 1974); p.13. [5] Ewert, op. cit., p.117. [6] Colm Dubh. 'An Index to the Given Names in the 1292 Census of Paris', Proceedings of the Known World Heraldic Symposium 1996 (SCA: Montgomery, Alabama; WWW: SCA, Inc., 1997). http://www.sca.org/heraldry/laurel/names/paris.html [7] Dauzat, Albert. Dictionnaire Etymologique des Noms de Famille et Prenoms de France (Paris: Libraire Larousse, 1987); s.n. Tuilier. [8] Compare, for instance, the masculine <Ferri le poissonier> 'fishmonger' and <Flori le lavendier> 'launderer' with the feminine <Famete la poissoniere> and <Aales la lavendiere>, all from [6]. [9] Lebel, Paul. Les noms de personnes en France. 6th ed. (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1968); p.69. [10] Dauzat, op cit. s.n. Lethuillier.