ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1205 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1205 ************************************ 9 Sep 1998 From: (Josh Mittleman) Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked for help choosing a name suitable for someone living in the Gaelic-speaking part of Scotland "by way of Germany" in the 12th century. You want to use the given name and have your father named . Here is what we have found. We aren't quite sure how you want to relate German and Scottish cultures in your persona. Whatever your background, your _name_ would have been chosen in the country where you were born. If you later moved to another country -- for example, if your father were a merchant who settled in one of the burghs of Scotland -- then the local inhabitants probably would have adapted your name to the local language. However, before we can suggest how your name might have appeared in a Scottish language, we need to know what it was in the language of your home. is a Spanish name. It is probably ultimately derived from the Gothic name , but we don't find evidence of it anywhere outside Iberia in our period. is recorded in Catalonia in 1184 and in Navarra in 1350. A similar, but probably unrelated name is recorded in Portugal between 913 and 1125. later spread to Castille and beyond, but we don't find it used elsewhere until after our period [1, 2]. It may have been carried to Germany in the late 16th century, when the Hapsburgs ruled both Spain and the Holy Roman Empire; it was definitely popularized in Germany after our period by Mozart's "Don Giovanni" [7, 8]. We don't find any name very similar to in period Britain. The closest we found are and , both Middle English forms of Old English names [3]. There were English speakers in southeastern Scotland in your period, but we don't have examples of these particular names in use in Scotland. is another name of Germanic origin, recorded in various forms in Germany, France, and Spain. It survived into your period in Germany, where we find the latinized in 1255 and in 1463 [9]. In France, we found examples from the 9th to 11th centuries [5]: Ernust 821 Arnostus 888 Arnustus 874, 926 Ernustus 966 Ernest 1003 Ernostus 1034-58 In Spain, we found evidence of the name in the 8th century, but nothing after that until modern times. It appears that the name dropped out of use in Spain and was revived as some time after our period [4]. As you can see, there is no place where we know that both and were used in the 12th century. The best possibility is northeastern Spain -- Catalonia or Navarra -- where was used and could perhaps have survived in occasional use. However, we think it is very unlikely that a Spaniard could have ended up living in Scotland in your period, and even less likely that he would have ended up in a Gaelic-speaking region of Scotland. Several languages were spoken in various parts of Scotland in your period: Norse, English, Norman French, and Gaelic. If you're considering a persona who is a foreign merchant who settled in Scotland, then you would have lived in one of the early burghs (towns) which began to form in the 12th century. Those settlements did attract merchants and craftsmen from the Germanies, especially Flanders and Holland, some of whom settled permanently in the new towns. However, these towns were overwhelmingly English-speaking in your period. Your persona might have come into contact with Gaelic speakers in the countryside, but would normally have spoken English or her native language. Before we can give you any more advice, we need some feedback from you. Is it most important to you to use the given name , or to be German or Dutch, or to be Scottish Gaelic? You can find information on any of these possibilities at the Medieval Names website, http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names If you would like us to discuss any of these possibilities in more depth, please don't hesitate to ask. I hope this letter has been useful. Please write us again if any part of it has been unclear or if you have other questions. I was assisted in researching and writing this letter by Talan Gwynek, Juliana de Luna, Effrick nin Kenneoch, Walraven van Nijmegen, Elsbeth Anne Roth, and Pedro de Alcazar. For the Academy, Arval Benicoeur 9 Sep 1998 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - References [1] Piel, Joseph M., and Kremer, Dieter, _Hispano-gotisches Namenbuch_ (Heidelberg: Carl Winter Universita:tsverlag, 1976), pp.64, 152. [2] Carrasco Pe/rez, Juan _La Poblacio'n de Navarra en el Siglo XIV_ (Pamplona, Spain: Ediciones Universidad de Navarra, S.A, 1973). [3] Talan Gwynek, "Feminine Given Names in _A Dictionary of English Surnames_" (SCA: KWHS Proceedings, 1994; WWW: J. Mittleman, 1997). http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/reaney/ [4] Tibo/n, Gutierre. _Diccionario Etimolo/gico Comparado de Nombres Propios de Persona_ (Union Tipografica Editorial Hispano Americana: Mexico), s.n. Ernesto. [5] Morlet, Marie-Therese, _Les Noms de Personne sur le Territoire de l'Ancienne Gaule du VIe au XIIe Siecle_, three volumes (Paris: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1972), I:85b, I:18. [6] Reaney, P. H., & R. M. Wilson, _A Dictionary of English Surnames_ (London: Routledge, 1991; Oxford University Press, 1995), s.n. Ernest. [7] Drosdowski, Guenther, _Duden Lexikon der Vornamen_, 2nd ed. (Mannheim: Dudenverlag, 1974). [8] Bahlow, Hans, _Unsere Vornamen im Wandel der Jahrhunderte_, Vol. 4 in the series _Grundriss der Genealogie_ (Limburg a. d. Lahn: C. A. Starke Verlag, 1965). [9] Talan Gwynek, "Medieval German Given Names from Silesia" (WWW: SCA, Inc., 1998). http://www.sca.org/heraldry/laurel/names/bahlow_v.htm - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -