ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1311 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1311 ************************************ ************************************************* * * * NOTE: Later research turned up additional * * information relevant to this report. * * See the end of the letter for details. * * * ************************************************* 13 Nov 1998 From: (Josh Mittleman) Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked for help choosing a 15th or 16th century Gaelic name for a woman born in Ireland who moved to Scotland with her Scottish husband. You said you'd like to use or some other form of as your given name, or some equivalent as your father's name, and the original Gaelic form of as your clan name. Here is what we have found. If you were born in Ireland, you would of course have been named according to Irish custom. When you moved Scotland, your name might have continued to be used in its original, Irish form; or it might have been re-interpreted (translated, in a sense) to fit Scottish naming customs. In your period, there were two languages spoken in Scotland: Gaelic, spoken in the Highlands, and Scots, spoken in the Lowlands and the towns. Gaelic was the same language spoken in Ireland at this time; Scots was closely related to contemporary English. Names were formed quite differently in the two languages, and the two styles of naming did not mix. We'll need to consider both these cultures in guessing how your Irish name might have been used in Scotland. is a Scots form of , and so could not have been the original Irish name for your persona. The Irish Gaelic form of was , pronounced \SHEE-bayl\, actually an adaptation of the Norman [1, 2]. The slash in the name represents an accent on the previous letter. Since this name was adopted from the Normans, it didn't exist in Ireland until the 13th century or so. is an English spelling of the Irish Gaelic masculine name , pronounced \DOO-vahn\, \DOO-ahn\ and possibly also \DOE-ahn\. This name seems to have dropped out of use in the early Middle Ages; it might perhaps have been used as late as the 13th century [1, 2]. If you don't want to change your period to the 13th century, you may want to consider some other possibilities for your father's name. One similar-sounding name is , pronounced \DOHN\ [1]. If that doesn't appeal to you, you can find a list of appropriate names on the web: 100 Most Popular Men's Names in Early Medieval Ireland http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/tangwystyl/irish100 The spellings of most of the names in that list are not appropriate for your period, but if you find two or three that you like, we'll be happy to provide the correct spellings and pronunciations for late-period Gaelic. is a modern anglicized form of the Irish Gaelic family name . Around 1600, we find it recorded in English records as , which is a pretty good guide to its pronunciation [2]. In period, a woman in Gaelic culture in either Ireland or Scotland was known as her father's daughter. the daughter of would have been called "Sibe/al daughter of Donn O/ Faircheallaigh". For short, she might have been called "Sibe/al daughter of Donn" or "Sibe/al of the O/ Faircheallaigh family". The changes in the spelling of the father's name are required by Gaelic grammar. They put his name into the possessive form (analogous to the <'s> in in English) and also reflect some changes in pronunciation that happen in Gaelic in some circumstances. The correct pronunciation of these names was different at different times in history and in different places. In Ireland early in your period, would have been \SHEE-bayl IN-yen ee AIR-ch@-lee\, where \ch\ represents the soft, cat's-hiss sound in the German word and \@\ is a schwa, like the final vowel in . Later in your period, the Irish would have pronounced this name \SHEE-bayl nee AIR-@-lee\. The phrase would have been something like \IN-yen DOON~\. Here \OO\ is pronounced as in , and \N~\ is the sound of the "ni" in or of the n-tilde in the Spanish . If you choose an appropriate late-period Irish Gaelic name for your father and fill in the correct grammatical forms in the examples we've given above, you'll have a fine name for an Irish woman of your period. The next step is to consider what she might have been called in Scotland. The first question we have to ask is where in Scotland she lived. If she lived in the Highlands or the Isles, where they spoke Gaelic, she might have continued to be known by her original Irish name. However, Scottish Gaelic naming customs were somewhat different from Irish, and the Gaels around her might have adapted her name to familiar patterns. wasn't used in Scotland; the Scottish Gaels used a similar name , pronounced \ISS-@-bel\ [3]. Scottish Gaelic women were also known as their father's daughters, though the words sounded different. would have been pronounced \ISS-@-bel NEE-yen DOON~\, and (with a slightly different spelling) might have been \ISS-@-bel nee-@n-ee AIR-ch@-leech\. However, we should stress that we're not sure how this second style of name might have adapted to Scottish Gaelic. Family names like were not a normal part of Scottish Gaelic naming practices; the only examples we've found in Scotland are used by Irish immigrants. We have no examples of women in Scotland known by some form of an Irish family name of this type. We therefore recommend a simple patronymic like as the choice most likely to be authentic. If, on the other hand, your persona lived in the Scots-speaking Lowlands, her name would have been adapted into Scots. would most likely have been rendered as , though it might also have become . The patronymic (surname that identifies your father) might have been rendered as [2]. The family name could have become or [4]. Thus, the same woman living in the Lowlands might have been called or . We hope this letter has been useful. Please write us again if any part of it has been unclear or if you have other questions. We were assisted in researching and writing this letter by Talan Gwynek and Aelfwyn aet Gyrwum. For the Academy, Giles Leabrook and Arval Benicoeur 13 Nov 1998 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - References [1] O/ Corra/in, Donnchadh and Fidelma Maguire, _Irish Names_ (Dublin: The Lilliput Press, 1990). [2] Woulfe, Patrick, _Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall: Irish Names and Surnames_ (Kansas City: Irish Genealogical Foundation). He has and as anglicizations of , recorded c.1600. [3] Arval Benicoeur, "Some Scottish Gaelic Feminine Names" (WWW: J. Mittleman, 1998). http://www.panix.com/~mittle/arval/scotgaelfem/ [4] Black, George F., _The Surnames of Scotland: Their Origin, Meaning and History_, (New York: The New York Public Library, 1986), s.n. Macharrie shows 1468 for Irish . Several entries show Irish surnames contracted in Scots: for 1549, for 1622. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Correction, 18 Oct 2001, Arval: After a word ending in 'n', like , the letters 'D' and 'T' do not lenite.