ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1500 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1500 ************************************ 28 Jan 1999 From: (Josh Mittleman) Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked whether the Welsh name is appropriate for a Scottish woman living between 1300 and 1450. You also asked how to call yourself "daughter of Aonghas". This letter is a brief answer to your question. Scotland in your period was home to more than one culture. The main division was between the Highlands, where they spoke Gaelic, and the Lowlands, where they spoke Scots. Gaelic was the same language spoken in Ireland at the time; Scots was a language similar to contemporary English. The two cultures had different naming customs, so the culture you pick will determine what sort of name you should use. We assume from your note that you want a Gaelic name, and that's what we'll discuss here. If you are interested in Lowland names, please write us again. is a modern Welsh name, derived from the Welsh word "primrose." It was not used as a name in our period [1]. Even if it had been used, it could not have appeared in a Gaelic name. Welsh and Gaelic used very different, incompatible spelling systems, so if a name were adopted from one into the other, it would have been spelled very differently. If you'd like to consider other Gaelic first names, you can find several lists on our medieval names website. Some Scottish Gaelic Feminine Names http://www.panix.com/~mittle/arval/scotgaelfem/ Early Irish Feminine Names From the Index To O'Brien's "Corpus Genealogiarum Hiberniae" http://www.us.itd.umich.edu/~ximenez/s.gabriel/docs/irish-obrien.html You're on the right track in wanting to identify yourself as your father's daughter; that was the most common form of surname in Gaelic culture in our period. However, you don't want to use ; that word did not exist in Gaelic until after our period. It actually doesn't mean "daughter", though it is often mis-used that way in modern names. The correct word is indeed , pronounced \IN-yen\ in your period. Allasan, daughter of Aonghas, would have been known as . The name was pronounced \#N-@s\, where \#\ represents a vowel not used in modern English, similar to the in ; and \@\ represents a schwa, the first sound in . You'll notice that when we incorporate your father's name into your surname, it changes spelling to . This is the possessive form of the name, pronounced \#N-@sh\. You can find more information on Gaelic women's names on the web: Quick and Easy Gaelic Bynames http://www.stanford.edu/~skrossa/medievalscotland/scotnames/quickgaelicbynames/ We hope this brief letter has been useful. Please write us again if you have any questions. Blaise de Cormeilles assisted me in preparing this letter. For the Academy, Arval Benicoeur 28 Jan 1999 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - References [1] Gruffudd, Heini, _Enwau i'r Cymry/Welsh Personal Names_ (Talybont: Y Lolfa, 1984).