ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 2043 http://www.s-gabriel.org/2043 ************************************ 9 Jun 2000 From: Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked us how a person's name might indicate illegitimacy, specifically in England or France in the time period 1350-1450. Here is the information we found. Bynames meaning "the bastard" were not uncommon in medieval England and France, since illegitimacy carried no particular stigma [1]. , and later simply , occurred with some frequency [1, 2]. We have citations for an in England in 1379 [2] and a in France in 1294 [3], making an excellent choice for your period of interest. By the 14th century, however, many people in England and France were using inherited surnames rather than literal descriptive bynames; thus a man named might have been the son of a man named , rather than having been of illegitimate birth himself. This would almost certainly have been the case by the fifteenth century. I hope that this letter has been useful to you. Please feel free to contact us if any part of this has been unclear or if you have any further questions. I was assisted in writing this letter by Aryanhwy merch Catmael, Pedro de Alcazar, Maridonna Benvenuti, Talan Gwynek, Arval Benicoeur, and Raquel Buenaventura. For the Academy, Adeliza de Saviniaco 9 June 2000 -------------------------------------------- [1] Reaney, P. H., & R. M. Wilson, _A Dictionary of English Surnames_ (London: Routledge, 1991; Oxford University Press, 1995). s.n. Bastard. [2] Bardsley, Charles, _A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames_ (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1980). s.n. Bastard. [3] Gysseling, Maurits, and Pierre Bougard, _L'Onomastique Calaisienne a la Fin du 13e Siecle_, Onomastica Neerlandica (Leuven: Institut voor Naamkunde, 1963). p. 15