ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1471 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1471 ************************************ 30 Dec 1998 From: (Josh Mittleman) Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked whether is a correct medieval Irish name. This letter is a brief answer to your question. If your aim is to find documentation for a name so that you can register it with the SCA College of Arms, we may or may not be able to help you. Documenting submissions isn't our focus: We want to help you to choose and use a name that fits the historical culture you are re-creating. 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 particular name, then we may not be able to help you. We cannot find as a name anywhere. The ~ represents a tilde over the [1]. and are modern English forms of , a saint's name used in medieval English and in several other European languages [2]. We did not find , , or as a period spelling of the name in any language and we did not find any form of the name in use in period Ireland. There is an Irish name that _looks_ similar, though it is pronounced quite differently: The Gaelic name or is pronounced \DAH-vahn\ [3]. It is possible that this name has been equated with in modern times. is an English spelling of a Gaelic clan name or family name, , the name of a well-known Connacht sept and a less well-known family in Thomond [4, 5]. The slash represents an accent on the previous letter. A name like would be a fine choice for a medieval Irish persona. If you would like to choose an authentic Irish name, you can find some information on the web: 100 Most Popular Men's Names in Early Medieval Ireland http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/tangwystyl/irish100/ Quick and Easy Gaelic Bynames http://www.stanford.edu/~skrossa/medievalscotland/scotnames/quickgaelicbynames/ If you would like to choose a name in a culture which used in our period, let us know and we'll be happy to help. We hope this brief letter has been useful. Please write us again if you have any questions. I was assisted in researching and writing this letter by Walraven van Nijmegen and Talan Gwynek. For the Academy, Arval Benicoeur 30 Dec 1998 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - References [1] You called this symbol an "enya"; we have never heard it called that before. As far as we know, the tilde is not used in any British language. It's used in Portuguese and Spanish, where it represents a nasal consonant, or , that is omitted from the word. Since there is no nasal consonant missing from , we would be surprised to see a tilde used in this name in period. [2] Withycombe, E.G., _The Oxford Dictionary of English Christian Names_, 3rd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988). The name is also recorded in various forms in French, Spanish, Greek, Italian, Polish, Hungarian, Russian, and probably in other languages. If you are interested in any of these possibilities, let us know and we'll send you the details. [3] O/ Corra/in, Donnchadh and Fidelma Maguire, _Irish Names_ (Dublin: The Lilliput Press, 1990), s.n. Daman. [4] Woulfe, Patrick, _Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall: Irish Names and Surnames_ (Kansas City: Irish Genealogical Foundation), s.n. O/ Ma/ille. [5] MacLysaght, Edward, _The Surnames of Ireland_ (Dublin: Irish Academic Press Ltd., 1985, ISBN 0-7165-2366-3), s.n. O Malley.