ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1330 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1330 ************************************ From: "Brian M. Scott" 1 Nov 1998 Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel! You asked for help documenting (or as close a match as possible) as a Japanese masculine name in the period 1400-1550. The sound system of Japanese is quite accurately described by the kana, which are the characters used to represent Japanese phonetically. Each kana represents a whole syllable, and there is a kana for each possible syllable. From the fact that there is no kana for a syllable we can infer that this is not a possible Japanese syllable. The closest is , and in fact there is a Japanese name element 'rock' that occurs in a number of surnames. [1, 2] In a two-element Japanese family name, the first element modifies the second. Thus, , from 'rock' and 'river', is 'rocky river', and , from 'rock' and 'bridge', is 'stone bridge'. [2, 3] Such family names normally make sense, often describing a feature of the local landscape, so the second element of a name beginning with has to refer to something that could reasonably be described as rocky or made of rock. According to our Japanese speaker, there is a word , but it refers to a design motif and so would not be described by 'rock'. In any case we have found no example of this element in period Japanese family names. There is also a word 'chestnut (tree)' that appears in the surname 'small chestnut'. However, a hypothetical or would most likely be understood as 'chestnut made of rock'; this is not a plausible description of a local landmark, and for that reason we do not think that such a surname would have been used. The only family name that we found that sounds a bit like is 'rock(y) river', which is found as early as 1183. Other attested surnames beginning with this element are: [2] Ishibashi 1392 'stone bridge' Ishida 1568 'rocky rice paddy' Ishidou 1392 'rock pagoda' Ishii 1392 'rock well' Ishizaki 1572 'rocky slope' However, we can construct a few others: 'rocky meadow', 'rocky delta', and 'lucky or fortunate chestnut'. So far as we can tell, all of these are consistent with period Japanese family naming practice. does not appear to have been used as a nanori, i.e., a man's formal given name. In fact, single-element nanori are quite rare. However, this element is found at the beginning of a great many attested nanori. (There are actually two different first elements represented here, both transcribed in Roman letters. One means 'long; oldest senior', and the other means 'forever'. Those containing the latter element are starred. The double-starred name contains an unidentified first element. Sometimes two or three names with different second elements have the same Roman spelling; in those cases the Roman spelling has been given once, followed by a date for each version.) [2] Nagachika 1147 Nagafuji* 1572 Nagafusa 1332 Nagahide 1572 Nagahira* 1147 Nagahiro** 1568 Nagahisa 1600 Nagakane 1332 Nagakata 1147 Nagakatsu 1568 Nagakatsu* 1568 Nagakiyo 1332 Nagamasa 1332 Nagamasa* 1332 Nagamichi 1332 Nagamitsu 1332, 1572 Nagamochi 1332 Nagamori 1332, 1600 Nagamoto 1332, 1392 Naganari 1600 Nagaoki 1572 Nagasada 1332 Nagashige 1392 Nagasue* 1392 Nagataka 1332 Nagateru 1568 Nagatoki 1332 Nagatoshi 1332 Nagauji 1332 Nagayo 1332 Nagayori 1332 Nagayoshi 1568, 1568, 1600 Nagayuki 1392, 1568 Nagayuki* 1392, 1572 Our first recommendation is to use a family name and nanori that are actually attested. However, we think that combining any of the three hypothetical surnames , , and with an attested nanori (e.g., ) would also be good historical re-creation. All unreferenced information on Japanese and Japanese naming was provided by Solveig Throndardottir. We hope that this letter has been helpful and that you will write again if you have any further questions. For the Academy, Talan Gwynek ===== References: [1] Shibatani, Masayoshi. 'Japanese', in Bernard Comrie, ed., _The World's Major Languages_ (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990). [2] Solveig Throndardottir. Name Construction in Mediaeval Japan (Carlsbad, N. Mex.: The Outlaw Press, 1994); pp. 151, 159, 346. [3] The pronunciation of some consonants can change depending on the preceding sounds, so that and may become and respectively.