ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1614
http://www.s-gabriel.org/1614
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1 Apr 1999
From:  (Josh Mittleman)


Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel!

You asked whether <Rowan Macmillan> is an appropriate name for a Lowland
Scottish woman around 1520 who is a member of the Macmillian clan.  This
letter is a brief answer to your question.

You contacted us on behalf of your friend.  We prefer to work direct with
our clients rather than through an intermediary.  If it's possible for your
friend to contact us directly, we'd appreciate it.  If not, then we thank
you for your help.


>From the late 14th century onward, there were two main languages spoken in
Scotland: Gaelic, spoken in the Highlands, and Scots, spoken in the
Lowlands, including the royal court and towns. Gaelic is the same language
spoken in Ireland at this time; Scots is closely related to contemporary
English. Names were formed quite differently in the two languages, and the
two styles of naming did not mix.  You wrote that your friend wants a
Lowland persona, so we will primarily discuss Scots naming practices.

<Rowan> was not a woman's name in our period.  It was a masculine name, an
anglicization of the Gaelic masculine name <Ru/adha/n> and perhaps also
(independently) a Scots spelling of the name <Rolland>.  (The slash
represents an accent on the preceding letter.)  However, we have found no
example of <Rowan> even as a man's given name in period Scotland.  It was
used as a surname: We found <Agnes Rowan> in Glasgow in 1511, and <William
Rowan> in Aberdeen, 1513 [1, 2].  We strongly recommend that your friend
choose a different first name.  She can find a list of 16th century Lowland
women's given names on the web:

  Early 16th Century Scottish Town Women's Names
    http://www.stanford.edu/~skrossa/medievalscotland/scotnames/scottownwomen16.html

<MacMillan> is a modern English spelling of the Gaelic patronymic surnames
<mac Mhaola/in> "son of Maola/n".  In Gaelic, names like this one were used
literally in our period.  That is to say, a Gael would have been called
<mac Mhaola/in> only if he were a man and his father's given name was
<Maola/n>.  The modern practice of using names like <Macmillan> as
inherited clan surnames did not develop until after our period.  There were
clans in Gaelic Scotland in our period, but a person's clan affiliation was
not included in her name.  There were no Gaelic clans in the Lowlands in
the 16th century.

Some Gaelic patronymics were adopted into Scots as inherited family names
by the 16th century, so it is possible for a Lowland woman to have the
surname <Macmillan>.  However, this particular spelling is unlikely to have
been used in period.  We found the name in Scots documents in the 16th
century in other spellings: <Robert Makmyllane>, burgess of Ayr in 1559,
also spelled <Makmyllen> in 1555 [3].  So, for example, <Agnes Makmyllane>
would be a fine name for your friend's persona, especially if she places
her persona in 16th century Ayr.  We should stress, though, that her
surname wouldn't imply anything about clan membership: She would not have
been a member of a clan.  Her name would simply have meant that her
father's surname was <Macmillan>.


We hope this brief letter has been useful.  Please write us again if you or
your friend have any questions or if any part of this letter is unclear.  I
was assisted in preparing this letter by Affrick neyn Kenneoch and Talan
Gwynek. 

For the Academy,


  Arval Benicoeur
  1 Apr 1999


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References

[1] Black, George F., _The Surnames of Scotland: Their Origin, Meaning and
History_, (New York: The New York Public Library, 1986), s.n. Rowan.

[2] O/ Corra/in, Donnchadh and Fidelma Maguire, _Irish Names_ (Dublin: The
Lilliput Press, 1990), s.n. Ru/adha/n.

[3] Black, op. cit., s.n. MacMillan.