ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1261 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1261 ************************************ 21 Sep 1998 From: (Josh Mittleman) Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked for information on period Romany names, particularly for a Romany woman living in Scotland or France, and you wondered if is an appropriate name. You also asked us to suggest some starting points for designing your arms. Here is what we have found. Before I start, I'd like to clarify the service that the Academy offers. We try to help Societyfolk in choosing and using names that fit the historical cultures they are trying to re-create. Our research can sometimes be used to support submissions to the College of Arms, but that it not our goal and our results are often incompatible with the College's needs. If your main goal is to register a name, then we may not be able to help you. The Romany reached Europe in the Middle Ages and spread slowly across the continent, arriving in some western countries only quite late in our period. You can find a timeline of Romany history on the web [7]; it will give you the basic parameters for developing your persona. We have found very little information about period Romany names. What we've discovered boils down to this: The Romany used at least two names each: a private name in their own language that was not used outside their community, and a public name in the language of the country where they lived. We have found no evidence at all on Romany private names. We have found a little evidence about their public names, which seem to be typical of the country where they are found. Therefore, the best general advice we can give you is that in public a Romany woman would have used a normal name for the time and place where she lived. We have found a few examples of Romany names in 16th century Lowland Scotland. There was a group in Aberdeen in 1541, described as "Egyptians", apparently living separately from the community. Four of their names are recorded [1]: Barbara Deya Baptista, also recorded as Barbara Babtista Helene Andree George Faw Johnne Faw The given names are entirely typical for this part of Scotland. The surnames are a little unusual. or was a common surname among border Gypsies [2], and neither and is recorded elsewhere in our Scottish name references, so they may have been typical of Gypsy families. As it happens, is a very typical name for late-period Aberdeen, so that would be a good place for you and your lord to work into your persona history [1]. We have found no information on used as a given name. It is a modern family name, perhaps a form of , which seems to be a German surname [3]. That name might derive from the towns of or near Magdeburg [4]. (The " represents an umlaut -- two dots -- over the .) Without some evidence that was used as a given name in period, we recommend that you choose a different name. If you'd like to consider some Lowland Scottish women's names, you can find a list from 16th century Aberdeen on the web: Early 16th Century Scottish Town Women's Names http://www.stanford.edu/~skrossa/medievalscotland/scotnames/scottownwomen16.html If you are more interested in a French name, you can find some lists of period French names on the web in the French section of this page: http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/romance.html is a Lowland Scottish surname, probably derived from the town of in Northumberland. is recorded in 1424, a different or in 1520-1 [2]. We don't have any evidence that this name was used by Romany families. We're not sure how you'll want to proceed. One approach would be to choose a name appropriate for a Romany woman living in Aberdeen in the mid-16th century, such as or . If you moved from Aberdeen to France, we'd expect the French to use some French adapation of your Scots name. would probably have become , for example, and might have become . If you want to design arms appropriate for your persona, the best start would be to look at examples of arms from Scotland or France in your period. There are a couple web sites where you can find examples of late-period French arms. One is illustrated, but contains arms from other places as well as France: L'Armorial de Nicolas de Lutzelbourg http://www.nancy2.u-nancy.fr/RECHERCHE/MOYENAGE/lutzsom.htm The other is not illustrated, but contains a long list of blazons of French 16th century arms: Analysis, Armorial, and Ordinary of Armory Recorded in Paul Bergman's Armorial De Flandre du XVIme Siecle http://www.geocities.com/Athens/1336/bergmans.html A bibliography of sources for period Scottish heraldry was published in the proceedings of the 1998 Known World Heraldic Symposium and is available on the web, too: An Annotated Bibliography of Scottish Heraldic Materials http://www.sca.org/heraldry/laurel/bib0409.html For a general information on period heraldic design, we can recommend two sources. Compleat Anachronist #22 is a very readable introduction to the subject [5]; Joseph Foster's Dictionary of Heraldry contains several thousand color drawings of arms from period English sources [6]. 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 Barak Raz, Giles Leabrook, Effrick neyn Kenneoch, Talan Gwynek, Zenobia Naphtali, Aryanhwy Prytydes, Walraven van Nijmegen, and Thorfinn Hrolfsson. For the Academy, Arval Benicoeur 21 Sept 1998 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - References [1] --, The manuscript Aberdeen Council Registers, Volumes 8 - 20 (1501-1551), in the Aberdeen City Archives. [2] Black, George F., _The Surnames of Scotland: Their Origin, Meaning and History_, (New York: The New York Public Library, 1986), s.nn. Faa, Wark. [3] www.rootsweb.com entries for [4] Brechenmacher, Josef Karlmann, _Etymologisches Worterbuch der deutschen familiennamen_ (Limburg a. d. Lahn, C. A. Starke-Verlag, 1957-1960), s.n. Rogasner. [5] Arval Benicoeur and Marten Bro"ker, "Heraldry", Compleat Anachronist #22 (Milpitas, CA: SCA, Inc., 1985). [6] Foster, Joseph, _The Dictionary of Heraldry_ (New York: Arch Cape Press, 1989). [7] _The Patrin Journal_ timeline of Gypsy history. http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5121/timeline.htm - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -