ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 2155
http://www.s-gabriel.org/2155
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From: Lisa and Ken Theriot 
27 Nov 2000


Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel!


You wanted to know whether <Euric Von Schwartzwald> is an appropriate name 
for a man from the Black Forest region of Germany between 1000 and 1300. 
 Here is the information we have found.


<Euric> is an early name most likely arising from the root elements <Eber-> 
and <-ric>. It is important for you to know that the letter <u> in <Euric> 
is a scribal equivalent for <v>; the same name is also recorded as 
<Evricus> and <Evericus>. [1]  It was pronounced \EHV-rik\ or \AYV-rik\. 
 We find forms of the name recorded as late as 1050, but not after; 
further, the instances of this name are Romanized Frankish, which would not 
be appropriate for use in Germany. [2]  We did find an Alemannic form, 
<Ebarrih>, which would be appropriate for areas of Germany nearer 
Switzerland, such as the Black Forest, but only very early. [3, 4]


You mentioned that you are pronouncing <Euric> like <Erich>; you may prefer 
to use a form of that name.  We find it recorded as <Erich> in 1293 and as 
<Erike> in 1266 and 1325 in Northern Germany. [5, 6]  Since the name was 
borrowed into German from Scandinavian sources, we are doubtful whether it 
would be appropriate any earlier, especially as far south as the Black 
Forest.  It was pronounced \EH-rik\.


Another similar name which may interest you is <Ulrich>.  There are two 
German saints by this name; the first, <Ulric>, was bishop of Augsburg. 
 His canonization in 993 is the first recorded canonization by a pope.  The 
second, <Ulrich>, was founding abbot of the monastery at Zell in the Black 
Forest; he died in 1083.  [7]  We find this name recorded in many forms 
throughout your period, but we believe that the most appropriate form for 
your location and period is <U*lrich>, which we find recorded in Alsace, 
not far from the Black Forest, in 1185. [8]   Here <U*> is a <U> with a 
small <o> directly over it.  It was pronounced roughly \OO@l-rikh\, where 
\@\ represents the sound of <a> in <soda> and <about>, and \kh\ represents 
the sound of <ch> in German <Bach>.


The Black Forest, or <Schwartzwald> region has apparently been known by 
some form of that name since the 9th century. [9]  Unfortunately, we do not 
find surnames based on the name until 1350, after your period. This could 
be because the area was so sparsely settled that no one thought to refer to 
it as someone's place of origin, or because people considered it too large 
to be a useful identifier for someone who did live there.  We find the same 
pattern for names based on the Odenwald.  For the very end of your period, 
however, we believe that <Swartzweldir> is a plausible name for a man from 
the Black Forest. [10]  If it existed, it would have been pronounced 
\SWARTS-wel-deer\ from before the beginning of your period into the 13th 
century.  During the 13th century, the pronunciation of <w> began to change 
from \w\ to \v\, making the pronunciation \SVARTS-vel-deer\ also possible 
for the end of your period.


Another possible explanation for the lack of bynames based on 
<Schwartzwald> is that local people referred to it only as "the forest". 
 We find the following names recorded in or near your period in Konstanz 
and Stuttgart, which are both near the Black Forest: [11]


<von Wald>, 1317   "from the forest" or possibly, "from (a place called) 
Wald"
<Waltman>, 1285   "woodsman, forester"
<Waldenarius>, 1286   "woodsman, forester"  [12]


We don't know absolutely that these names relate to the Black Forest, but 
they do give you other options.  We believe that any of these names would 
be appropriate for at least the last fifty years of your period.  Prior to 
1250, we do not find any names which we believe are appropriate to use in 
reference to the Black Forest.  If you would like more options for the 
early part of your period, we recommend you choose a byname based on a more 
settled area, such as a town.  Please write again if you would like further 
assistance.


You should be aware that such a byname probably implies that the bearer no 
longer lives in the Black Forest; bynames of location were only useful if 
they didn't describe everyone in the neighborhood.   You would probably not 
have to go far from the Black Forest in order for the byname to be 
meaningful, as we see in the examples from Konstanz and Stuttgart.


In summary, we can recommend <U*lrich> as a fine choice for your period; we 
believe <U*lrich Waltman> or <U*lrich Swartzweldir> are possible forms for 
the end of your period for a man from the Black Forest who is now living 
elsewhere.


We hope that this letter has been useful to you, and that you will not 
hesitate to write again if any part was unclear or if you have further 
questions.  I was assisted in researching and preparing this letter by 
Amant le Marinier, Arval Benicoeur, Blaise de Cormeilles, Dietmar von 
Straubing, Juliana de Luna, and Talan Gwynek.


For the Academy,


Adelaide de Beaumont
27 November 2000


References:


[1]     Morlet, Marie-Therese, _Les Noms de Personne sur le Territoire de 
l'Ancienne Gaule du VIe au XIIe Siecle_, three volumes (Paris: Centre 
National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1972), I:78a.


[2]     When people who spoke a language descended from Latin (e.g., Old 
French) borrowed or continued to use names of Germanic origin, these names 
underwent various sound changes according to the local Romance (= 
Latin-descended) dialect.  The citations we found show signs of having 
undergone these changes.  In most of Germany you don't see these kinds of 
changes, because there was no significant population speaking a Romance 
dialect.


[3]     Alemannic is an Upper German dialect (or family of dialects) spoken 
in Switzerland
and adjacent parts of Germany.


[4]     Mu"ller, Gunter, _Studien zu den Theriophoren Personennamen der 
Germanen_ (Ko"ln: Bo"hlau Verlag, 1970), p. 154.  The specific form 
<Ebarrih> is undated, but it resembles forms which we see recorded from the 
9th or 10th c., too early for your period.  We believe it was pronounced 
roughly \AY-bar-rikh\, where \kh\ represents the sound of <ch> in German 
<Bach>.


[5]     Bahlow, Hans, _Deutsches Namenlexikon : Familien- und Vornamen nach 
Ursprung und Sinn erklaert_ (Frankfurt am Main : Suhrkamp Taschenbuch 
Verlag, 1985, 1990), s.n. Erich.  You should be aware that the name <Erich 
von dem Schwarzwald> is already registered in the SCA; any name you 
construct using the elements <Erich> and <Schwarzwald> may be considered 
too close for registration.


[6]     Zoder, R., _Familiennamen in Ostfalen_. 2 vols. (Hildesheim: 1968), 
p. 29.  It is possible that the <-e> could be a grammatical addition, so 
that the name would actually be <Erik>.


[7]     Catholic Online Saints Index, (WWW: Catholic Online, 2000), 
http://saints.catholic.org/stsindex.html , accessed 27 November 2000, s.nn. 
Ulric, Ulrich.  These are modern renderings of the saints' names, and we 
are unsure which form of the name they would actually have used.


[8]     Socin, Adolf, _Mittelhochdeutsches Namenbuch. Nach oberrheinischen 
Quellen des 12. und 13. Jahrhunderts_ (Basel: Helbing & Lichtenhahn, 1903; 
Hildesheim: Georg Olms Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1966), pp. 38, 111, 171.


[9]     Schwarz, Ernst, _Deutsche Namenforschung. II: Orts- und Flurnamen_ 
(Goettingen: Vandenhoek & Ruprecht, 1950), p. 186.


[10]     Brechenmacher, Josef Karlmann.  Etymologisches Woerterbuch der
Deutschen Familiennamen (Limburg a. d. Lahn: C. A. Starke-Verlag, 1957-60); 
s.nn. Odenwa"lder, Schwarzwald.  Under the citation for Odenwa"lder, the 
author gives the example <Joh. Odenweldir> recorded in 1350, which would 
indicate "Johannes from the Odenwald."  There were no forms of the names 
derived from either the Odenwald or the Schwartzwald given, even through 
modern times, which included the preposition <von>.


[11]     Brechenmacher, op. cit., s.nn. Walder, Waldman, Waldner.


[12]     This is a Latin form; the root name would be Middle High German 
<Walden{ae}re>, where {ae} represents the letter ash, a character where the 
letters <a> and <e> are combined into one.  This byname developed into the 
modern byname <Waldner>.  Names were frequently recorded in Latin, although 
the names would often be quite different in common use.  A man whose name 
was recorded in Latin as <Ulricus Waldenarius> would likely have been known 
locally as <U*lrich Walden{ae}re>.