ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1559 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1559 ************************************ 23 Feb 1999 From: (Josh Mittleman) Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked for information about the name , pronounced \GRAY-hun\, which you thought might be Welsh, Irish, or Scottish. This letter is a brief answer to your question. The Academy tries to help people to choose names to suit a particular time and place in history. Since you didn't tell us much about the persona that goes with the name, we can't do that for you. We can give you some general information about the name and when and where it was used, and point you to some sources where you can learn more about names from that period. 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 did not find , in that spelling, as a name of any kind. The closest thing we found in the British Isles is the early medieval Gaelic masculine given name . This is pronounced \GRAY-khahn\, where \kh\ is the rasping sound in words like the Scottish or German . The slashes in the name represent accents on the preceding letters. was the root of the Gaelic family name , which has come down to modern times in the anglicized form or simply [1, 2]. is appropriate for an Irish persona before 1200. If you're interested in using the name , we recommend that you read the article "Quick and Easy Gaelic Bynames", which you can find on the web at . It explains the general patterns of name construction in medieval Gaelic in both Ireland and Scotland. Please note that Gaelic and Welsh were quite different languages, with different systems of naming and spelling. Gaelic and Welsh name elements cannot be mixed together. 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 Maridonna di Benvenuto, Talan Gwynek, and Walraven van Nijmegen. For the Academy, Arval Benicoeur 23 Feb 1999 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - References [1] Woulfe, Patrick, _Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall: Irish Names and Surnames_ (Kansas City: Irish Genealogical Foundation), s.n. O/ Gre/acha/in. [2] MacLysaght, Edward, _The Surnames of Ireland_ (Dublin: Irish Academic Press Ltd., 1985, ISBN 0-7165-2366-3), s.n. (O) Grehan.