Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 211

Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 211

This report is available at http://www.s-gabriel.org/211

Some of the Academy's early reports contain errors that we haven't yet corrected. Please use it with caution.

Greetings,

Here's the information we found on the name "Leala."

Essentially, we weren't able to find any evidence that this name was used in period. There is an ancient Roman name "Laelia" which is found until the 4th century, but this is the closest name we found.

We did find an Arabic name "Layla," but unless you're interested in a Middle Eastern persona this would not be appropriate--"Layla" wasn't used by native Europeans until it was used by Lord Byron in the 19th century.

We recommend that you decide which culture you'd like to recreate, and spend some time researching it before choosing a name. You will have a much easier time finding a name if you first find a period and area in which you'd like to start looking. One of the best easily available resources for information on different areas is the "Encyclopedia Britannica;" if you can find an "Encyclopedia of the Middle Ages," you'll be able to get more specific information. There is some very basic information on a variety of cultures which are not usually seen in the SCA at the Web page

http://www.itd.umich.edu/~ximenez/s.gabriel/cultures.html

Arval D'Espas Nord, Effric neyn Kenyeoch vc Ralte, and Zenobia Naphtali all contributed to this letter.

We hope this has been helpful. If we can be of further assistance, please let us know.

In service,
Alan Fairfax
Academy of S. Gabriel