ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1367 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1367 ************************************ From: "S Friedemann" 23 Dec 1998 Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You wanted to know if is an appropriate name for a Scotsman living between 1350 and 1450. You also wanted to know what arms they used. Here is the information we have found. Unfortunately, the only instance that we found of or used as a masculine name was that of in the New Testament [3]. We did find a few names that were ultimately derived from the Greek , in French, Russian, and Latin [4,5], but these would not be appropriate in a Scottish name. Additionally, , which was the name of an ancient Greek goddess, is not a valid spelling variant of . We recommend that you consider a different name. For a list of names appropriate for your period, we suggest you look at the following article in our library: "13th & 14th Century Scottish Names" http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/symonFreser/scottish14/ in some spelling would be a fine surname for your period. We found in 1271, c. 1285, and 1312. [1] A name such as or would be a fine Lowland Scottish name for your period. [2] The use of the preposition tells us that was originally a place name. Toward the end of your period, the surname might have been used without the preposition. We were unable to find any arms used by the Ardrossanes in period. For ideas of what sorts of arms would be appropriate for your period, we suggest you look at Joseph Foster's _Dictionary of Heraldry_ [6]. This book contains several thousand color drawings of English arms from your period. Scots heraldic style wasn't exactly the same as English, but it was similar, so this book would be a good guide for the types of arms your persona was likely to have used. A list of sources for Scottish heraldry is available on the web at: "An Annotated Bibliography of Scottish Heraldic Materials" http://www.sca.org/heraldry/laurel/bib0409.html We hope that this letter has been useful to you, and that you will not hesitate to write again if any part was unclear or if you have further questions. Research and commentary on this letter was provided by Zenobia Naphtali, Arval Benicoeur, Tangwystyl verch Morgant Glasvryn, Walraven van Nijmegen, Talan Gwynek, Margaret Makafee, AElfwyn aet Gyrwum, and Rouland Carre. For the Academy, --Aryanhwy merch Catmael December 23, 1998 --------------------------------------- References: [1] Black, George F., _The Surnames of Scotland: Their Origin, Meaning and History_, (New York: The New York Public Library, 1986).s.n. Ardrossan. [2] Symon Freser of Lovat, "13th & 14th Century Scottish Names" (WWW: J. Mittleman, 1996) http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/symonFreser/scottish14/ [3] Titus 3:12 [4] Morlet, Marie-Therese, _Les Noms de Personne sur le Territoire de l'Ancienne Gaule du VIe au XIIe Siecle_, Volume II (Paris: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1972). p. 21b [5] Unbegaun, B. O., _Russian Surnames_ (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971). p. 48 [6] Foster, Joseph, _The Dictionary of Heraldry_ (New York: Arch Cape Press, 1989).