Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 021

Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 021

This report is available at http://www.s-gabriel.org/021

This is one of the Academy's earliest reports. We are not confident that these early reports are accurate. Please use it with caution.

Greetings,

Here's the information we can give you about your name, "Renee de la Fleur Rouge." We haven't come to a definite "yes" or "no" answer; we'll explain what we found and let you make your own decision.

"Rene'e" is the feminine form of the male name "Rene'" (the e' stands for an accented e). Both derive from the Latin name "Renatus," which was popular both because it was the name of a saint and because of its meaning, "reborn."

There are a number of medieval examples of the male name "Rene'," but we didn't find any examples of the feminine form. In fact, one of the leading authorities on French names says that "Rene'e" was not used in the Middle Ages (1).

On the other hand, we found other Latin names which followed the pattern

Latin Male      ->      French Male     ->      French Female
Honoratus       ->      Honore'         ->      Honore'e
Amatus          ->      Aime'           ->      Aime'e

According to this pattern, "Renatus" could eventually become "Rene'e." However, this may not have happened. French also has the name "Renata," which is a different female form of "Renatus." It's possible that the name "Renatus" became "Renata" and that, as our sources say, "Rene'e" was not used until the modern era.

The simple answer is that we're not sure whether "Rene'e" would be a plausible medieval name or not. It fits a recognized pattern but the author who the College of Arms uses as a standard source for information on French names says clearly that the name did not exist in the Middle Ages. It may be that "Rene'e" is an exception to the pattern, or that the author made a mistake. Without extensive primary-source research, it would be hard to make a more definite statement.

If you're interested in registering "Renee," you can do so because it's your mundane first name. SCA rules allow a person to register a part of their mundane name as the same part of their SCA name--in this case, you could register your mundane given name as your SCA given name.

We weren't able to document "de la Fleur Rouge." There are plenty of names which are based on "Fleur" and "Rouge," (notably Delafleur). We found "Blanchefleur," but only as a first name. If you're interested in something that sounds like "de la Fleur Rouge," "Delafleur" is as close as we were able to find. If you're interested in a name which compares you to a red flower, we can look around for period names with those connotations.

Regarding your device: we don't know of any examples of mullets colored so that different points had different colors. However, the compass-star itself is a modern invention that wasn't used in medieval heraldry. There is, of course, no problem with the rose or some other flower. You should be aware that a heraldic rose doesn't look like a realistic picture of a rose; I can't give you a good description with text but it should be possible to find a picture of a heraldic rose.

I hope this information is useful. If you'd like other ideas for your device, or want to bounce more ideas off of us, we'd be more than happy to offer help.

In service,
Alan Fairfax
Academy of St. Gabriel