ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 2401 http://www.s-gabriel.org/2401 ************************************ From: Lisa and Ken Theriot 25 Jan 2002 Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked for our opinion of the name for a 15th century woman from the Scottish Highlands, and whether the name would be appropriate for the 8th and 13th centuries as well. You also asked if would be appropriate for one or more of those periods, and about the name . Here is the information we have found. You've asked a very complicated question. Every language in Europe changed tremendously over the centuries covered by your inquiry. Even in an area where a single language and culture was dominant throughout the period, the fifteenth-century inhabitants would probably have understood little of their language as it was spoken in the eighth century. Further, names tend to vary in popularity over time according to fashion; there are very few names which remained popular across a span of eight centuries. Scotland was a culturally complex area, so your question is complicated not only by the span of time, but by the number of different cultures that inhabited various parts of Scotland over those centuries. We'll begin with some linguistic history of Scotland, and then address your name elements, and the overall form of your name. This will be necessarily complex; please bear with us. BACKGROUND The linguistic history of the area that became modern Scotland is very complex. In the 8th century, the area that is now Scotland had many overlapping cultures speaking as many different languages: * Cumbric (a Brythonic language closely related to Welsh) in the southwest; * Old English in the southeast; * Pictish in the north; and * Gaelic in the west. Norse speakers began settling in various Northern and coastal areas in the 9th century, and Norman French speakers moved into the South from England around the 12th century. By the 13th century, Pictish and Cumbric had disappeared, but Gaelic and English were still being spoken, joined by Norse and Norman French, distributed roughly as follows: * Norse, spoken mainly in the Northern Isles; * English, spoken in the southeast, the towns, and spreading to most of the eastern coastal areas; * Norman French, spoken by Anglo-Norman settlers and their Scoto-Norman descendents (who often also spoke English), mostly in the south, and * Gaelic, spoken through much of the country. From around the 14th century, the two main languages spoken in Scotland were Gaelic, spoken in the Highlands and Western Isles, and Scots, spoken in the Lowlands, including the royal court and towns. Gaelic was the same language spoken in Ireland at this time; Scots was closely related to contemporary English. Norn (a form of Norse) as well as Scots was spoken in the Northern Isles through the 16th century. The languages were very different and had different naming customs. There was some mixing of names from the different cultures, but most names were not adopted into all of the cultures. Therefore, the culture you choose for your persona will determine how your name should be constructed. You specified that you wanted a name appropriate for the Highlands; for the 15th and 16th centuries, that will certainly mean that you need a Gaelic name. Unfortunately, the idea that Scotland was divided culturally into "Highlands" and "Lowlands" did not develop until the late 14th century. Areas that in the 15th century would be called "Highland" were not a single uniform cultural region in the 8th century; in some areas Pictish was spoken, in some areas Gaelic was spoken, and some may even have spoken Cumbric, if we include the geographic Highlands in the southwest. What would be appropriate for your 8th century name (and even your 13th century name) depends on exactly where you lived. We will concentrate on Gaelic; if you would like to explore possibilities for names in other languages, please write us again and we'll be happy to help you. Gaelic was sometimes used as a written language in Scotland from at least the 12th century, but few Scottish Gaelic documents survive. Accordingly, most of our evidence of Gaelic names comes from other languages. The form of the name of a Gael in Scots or Latin usually differed from the form of their name in Gaelic as names were transformed to fit the naming customs of the language being used. Also, a written form of a name often differed from the spoken form, even in the same language, and some forms, like many in Latin documents, were exclusively used in writing. We can often establish that some form of a name was used by Gaelic speakers in Scotland, but we cannot always say what form it took in Gaelic or how a Gael would have spelled it. The written language of Scotland before the 14th century was Latin. Scots rose as a written language in the late 14th century and became increasingly important over the next two centuries, but Latin remained in use for various kinds of documents into the 17th century. CAIRISTIONA is a modern Gaelic form of . Forms of were in use in Scotland from at least the early 13th century, used by non-Gaels [1]. The name was adopted into Gaelic, but we do not know exactly when nor do we know how the name was spelled in Scottish Gaelic in our period. The earliest record we have of a Gaelic woman using a form of is in Ireland; she died around 1270 [2, 3]. Her name is recorded in Gaelic, but her given name is in the Latin form , so it appears that Irish Gaels were using the Latin form of the name in the 13th century. We also have examples in Latin of a Scottish Gaelic woman who lived in the late 13th or early 14th century; her name was recorded in several ways [4]: Christiana de Marre 'Christina of Mar' Cristina filia Alani 'Christina, daughter of Alan' Based on these examples, we believe that some form of is possible for a Gaelic woman in the late 13th century, though we would expect that a woman recorded as in the 13th century is much more likely to be a non-Gael. Another Scottish Gaelic woman recorded in Latin as was granted a license to marry in 1388 [4]. A Latin record of Gaels who were parishioners in Kilmacronak in Muckarne (in the west Highlands) in 1541 included two women whose names were recorded in Latin as and [5]. The first is a typical Latin form of , but the second probably represents an attempt to render a Gaelic name phonetically into Latin. If we apply the normal rules for spelling 16th century Gaelic to the pronunciation implied by the Latin spelling , we get the modern spelling [6]. We don't know how much earlier than 1541 was in use among Scottish Gaels; it may have been in use in the 15th century or it may have been only a 16th century development. It was pronounced roughly \kar-ih-STYEE-n@\, where \Y\ is a consonantal sound of and \@\ indicates the sound of in and . The first syllable should sound like , not . We have several 16th-century examples from Scots-language records of the names of women we believe to be Gaelic speakers who bear some form of the name ; spellings include , , and [20]. A form of was also common among non-Gaelic Scots-speakers at the beginning of the 16th century. The most common spelling we find recorded is ; this spelling would not be appropriate for a Gaelic speaker [7]. Since we have no evidence of any form of in the 8th century, we cannot recommend it as a good recreation for any culture in Scotland. It is a possible choice for a late 13th century Scottish Gaelic woman, given our Irish Gaelic and Scottish Latin evidence, though we recommend a Latin spelling, or . These spellings are also a better recreation for a 15th century Scottish Gaelic woman; we do not recommend as a plausible recreation before the 16th century. We would expect the form to be found in either Latin or Gaelic records, but we would only expect to find in Latin records. The sounds represented by and were very different to a Gaelic speaker; further, the letter has grammatical significance in Gaelic which would make it especially unlikely to appear in a Gaelic spelling of a woman's name. Note neither the 13th century Irish Gaelic record of nor the modern Gaelic spelling uses . OTHER GIVEN NAMES You expressed an interest in finding one name which would be appropriate in Gaelic for the 8th, 13th, and 15th centuries. Our resources for Scottish Gaelic women's names are very limited, especially for the earlier periods, so we often look to Irish Gaelic for evidence. A list of feminine names from several dated Irish Annals may be found in our library: Index of Names in Irish Annals: Feminine Names http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/mari/AnnalsIndex/Feminine/ You will see that the fashions in names changed quite a lot across the centuries; however some names do appear over a broad period. Unfortunately, there are several names which appear in Ireland across many centuries for which we have no evidence in Scotland in any century; we have not included them in the list below. If you would like to explore the possibilities of an Irish Gaelic name, please write again. The following are names which both fit the periods you inquired about, and for which we have some evidence in Scotland: Affraic, 8th, 9th, 14th centuries Derbforgaill (Dearbhorgaill), 7th, 11th-15th centuries Derbfa/il (Dearbha/il), 10th-15th centuries Mo/r, 7th, 10th-16th centuries The first spelling given for each name is the form appropriate before about 1200; the spelling in parentheses is the expected post-1200 form. (Where there is no parenthetical form, the first form is appropriate for the entire period.) The slash represents an accent over the preceding letter. If you would like the pronunciations of any of these names, please write us again. The Irish Gaelic and Scottish Gaelic naming pools were quite similar in the 8th century, but they diverged over time. By the 15th and 16th centuries, they were probably quite distinct, so the best evidence for a name in Scotland is to find that name in Scottish records, even when those records are not in Gaelic. We have the following evidence of the names listed above, in Scotland: Affraic, found in various forms from the 12th century on [8] Derbforgaill, found as in Latin in the 13th century [9] Derbfa/il, found in various forms in the 15th century [10] Mo/r, the name found recorded in Latin in 1541 [2] If you would like more information on any of these names, please write again. Another possibility may be (later, ); we have evidence of the name in Ireland only in the 9th and 10th centuries, but we have examples we believe are from Gaelic woman recorded in Scotland in 1284 (Latin records) and 1568 (Scots records) [8, 11]. In general, we believe that a name found in late period is a better speculation for all three periods than one found, say, only in the middle period; accordingly or is a better choice than . You might be interested in the following article available on the web: "Scottish Gaelic Given Names for Women" http://www.MedievalScotland.org/scotnames/gaelicwomen/ This article is in process and is being regularly updated; you may find additional information if you check back periodically. Currently, it does not include any evidence from the early end of your period, which is why we recommend that you also check the Irish Gaelic data. BYNAME Your byname, , is an anglicization of the Gaelic byname 'son of Raghnall'. Such bynames were used literally in Gaelic in our period, so only a man would have been called , and only if his father's given name were . The Gaelic name was borrowed into Gaelic from Old Norse [12]. Gaelic women were usually identified as their father's daughters: Where a man was 'son of Ragnall', his sister was 'daughter of Ragnall' [13]. The word was spelled after about 1200; it was pronounced \EEN-y@n\ in Scottish Gaelic until about the end of the 15th century, \NEE-y@n\ later. is the genitive (possessive) form of ; just as the English becomes in the phrase , so a Gaelic name will change in ways determined by Gaelic grammar. In the 15th century, we'd expect your byname to be recorded in Gaelic as . In the 13th century, it might appear in this form, or in the earlier spelling . Both spellings were pronounced \EEN-y@n RAHGH-nahl~\. Here \GH\ represents the voiced \kh\; \kh\ is the rasping sound of in Scottish 'lake' or German 'oh' and [14]. The symbol \l~\ represents a palatalized , the sound of in the French word 'million' and Italian 'of the'. would be a fine 15th century Scottish Gaelic woman's name; it would also be a possible choice for the 13th century, when it might also be spelled in Gaelic records. The byname might appear in many different forms in Latin and Scots records. In early Latin records, or seems to have been rendered exclusively as the Latin ; later, Latin forms nearer to the Scots spellings appeared as well. We find the following byname forms, meaning 'of Reginaldus' or 'of Ranald', all from Latin records [4, 15]: Reginaldi, before 1222 (this man was definitely a Gaelic-speaker) Reginaldi, 1376, 1398 Raynaldi, 1433 Rannald, 1463, 1472 Renaldi, 1494 We find no Latin forms beginning in , or before the 15th century, but conservative Latin orthography continues to render or as through the 15th century [4]. Very early Latin records usually rendered 'son of Reginaldus' and 'daughter of Reginaldus' as and , respectively. Over time, the words 'son' and 'daughter' were frequently left out, so the bynames meaning 'son of Reginaldus' and 'daughter of Reginaldus' were identical. We find a 15th century Gaelic woman recorded in a Latin document as 'Marcella, daughter of Celestinus' [4], and a 16th century Gaelic woman recorded in Latin as [20]. In some later records, though, women's names still included even when men's names consistently dropped [22]. Accordingly we believe that a woman known in Gaelic as might appear as or in 13th century Latin records and as or in 15th century Latin records, to name a few possibilities. Though we have no 15th century examples, we believe is appropriate in a Scots-language context; it became common in the 16th century. A man appears in a Scots language document of 1511 as both and ; the second form indicates that his name was likely Gaelic in origin [15]. would also be appropriate for a woman; beginning in the fifteen century, surnames began to be more inherited than literal among Scots-speakers, and so we see inherently masculine forms used for women. We find record in 1459 of "Catharine Alansoune and her father John Alansone", and we find in 1590 [15]. Scots records also display Gaelic names in forms more similar to Gaelic; the example indicates a possible Scots rendering of a Gaelic name like . We find a man recorded as in 1483 [15]. We find women recorded in Scots language documents both with , , or of masculine forms, and with or as a rendering of the Gaelic . Examples from the 15th century of women with Gaelic-origin names in Scots-language records include [15]: Molmoria M'Kesek, 1476 Rinalde N'Gynnayr, 1452 Any of these forms might be used, and as the example indicates, a person might be known by different forms within the same document. A 15th century Gaelic woman named might accordingly find herself recorded as or in Scots records, just to name a few forms. Since the Norse did not move into Gaelic-speaking areas until the 9th century, the name could not have been borrowed into Gaelic before then. Accordingly, we do not believe that , or the earlier form , is appropriate as the name of the father of an 8th century Gaelic woman. If you'd like to select a different name for your father, we recommend the following article: 100 Most Popular Men's Names in Early Medieval Ireland http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/tangwystyl/irish100/ Though these names are from early Ireland, we believe they are equally appropriate for early Gaelic Scotland, as the naming pools were very similar in the early period [16]. Please write again if you'd like us to help you construct a feminine byname from any of these names. PLACENAMES As we mentioned in earlier correspondence, Scottish Gaelic speakers used locative bynames, or bynames indicating where they lived, only very rarely when their names were recorded in Gaelic. We do find examples of Scottish Gaels recorded in Latin or Scots records with locatives, though we note that in the cases we have found so far the individual held or was closely related to the person who held the land or territory of that name. It is possible that a Gaelic woman called might be recorded in a Latin document as , but we believe, only if she or her family held Balvenie. There are further problems with your particular choices of placenames. is near Fyvie, in Aberdeenshire, in an area that was Scots-speaking in the 15th century; it is not in the Highlands. We find the name recorded in 1382, and we do not believe he was a Gael [17]. Balvenie Castle is near Dufftown, just inside the Highlands; however, it was likely held by Scots speakers in the 15th century. There would certainly be Gaelic speakers living and working there, but we do not believe that they would include in their names. As we noted earlier, a form of was common among Scots speakers; if it is important to you to be from Balvenie, then you might prefer a Scots name. is an excellent 15th century name for a Scots-speaking woman from Balvenie. We haven't found any place in Scotland called . You mentioned that it is the name of your subdivision; we aren't sure where the name comes from, though it is similar to some other Anglicizations of Gaelic placenames. For example, there is a place in Ireland called from the Gaelic 'lake of the yew' [21]. Since we cannot identify the underlying Gaelic name, we cannot guess at a correct Gaelic form. We do not believe that is appropriate as part of a Gaelic name in any case. IGRAINE is the name of a character in Malory's Le Morte Darthur [18]. That character is usually called in earlier versions of the Arthurian romances [19]. We have no evidence that the name was used in Scotland in any of your periods, by speakers of any of the extant languages. We have not found any Gaelic names which are at all similar. SUMMARY In summary, we can recommend the following Gaelic names: , 16th century (though we cannot be certain of the spelling) , 15th century or , late 13th century These names would appear in different forms in Latin or Scots records. No form of or is appropriate in the 8th century, and we do not recommend any form of , , or as part of a Scottish Gaelic name in any of your periods. We hope this letter has been useful. Please write us again if any part of it has been unclear or if you have other questions. I was assisted in researching and writing this letter by Arval Benicoeur, Aryanhwy merch Catmael, Effrick neyn Kenneoch, Juliana la Caminante de Navarra, Julie Stampnitzky, Mari neyn Brian, Talan Gwynek, Tangwystyl verch Morgant Glasvryn, and Ursula Georges. For the Academy, Adelaide de Beaumont 25 January 2002 References: [1] Talan Gwynek, "A List of Feminine Personal Names found in Scottish Records" (WWW: J. Mittleman, 1996). http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/talan/scottishfem/ [2] Donnchadh O/ Corra/in & Mavis Cournane, "Annals of the Four Masters", six volumes (WWW: CELT: Corpus of Electronic Texts: a project of University College, Cork, Ireland, 1997-98), http://www.ucc.ie/celt/online/G100005C (v.3, M1172-M1372), entries 1269.8 and 1270.9. Both entries, as well as the entry from the Annals of Connacht, refer to the same woman. [3] Cournane, Mavis, Vibeke Dijkman, and Ivonne Tummers, "Annals of Connacht" (WWW: CELT: Corpus of Electronic Texts: a project of University College, Cork, Ireland, 1997) http://www.ucc.ie/celt/online/G100011, entry 1269.9. [4] Munro, Jean and R. W. Munro, eds., _Acts of the Lords of the Isles 1336-1493_; Scottish History Society, Fourth Series, Volume 22 (Edinburgh: Blackwood, Pillans & Wilson, 1986), documents 10 and 18, and appendix D, table 1, note 13 and table 4, note 4. Document no. 48, p. 72 includes in a 1498 charter confirming a 1436x49 grant. Appendix D, table 1, note 11 shows in a charter "probably before 1222". [5] Ewen, C. L'Estrange. A History of Surnames of the British Isles. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, 1931. Reprint, Detroit: Gale Research Company, 1968, p. 209. [6] Gaelic orthography has fairly fixed rules, especially by the 16th century; accordingly, we can construct a spelling which we have not actually found in period records. We call this a normalized spelling, which can be thought of as the theoretically correct spelling according to the rules for the period under consideration rather than the most common spellings actually found. [7] Krossa, Sharon L. (Effric neyn Kenyeoch vc Ralte), "Early 16th Century Scottish Lowland Names" (WWW: Privately published, 2001). Though Lowland names are not typically a good model for what was common among the Gaelic-speaking population, they at least provide additional evidence that the name existed in Scotland. Lowland name collections usually include both names that we would not expect to see among Gaels, like , and names that we would expect to see among Gaels, like . http://www.medievalscotland.org/scotnames/lowland16/ [8] Black, George F., _The Surnames of Scotland: Their Origin, Meaning and History_, (New York: The New York Public Library, 1986, s.nn. Africa, Muriel. [9] Webster, Bruce, ed., _Regesta Regum Scottorum VI: The Acts of David II_ (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1982), document 235. [10] Watson, William J., ed., _Scottish Verse from the Book of the Dean of Lismore_, Scottish Gaelic Texts, Volume 1, (Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd, 1937), page 262. [11] Mackay, William and Herbert Cameron Boyd, eds. Records of Inverness: Volume I: Burgh Court Books: 1556-86. Aberdeen: The New Spalding Club, 1911. [12] O/ Corra/in, Donnchadh and Fidelma Maguire, _Irish Names_ (Dublin: The Lilliput Press, 1990), s.n. Ragnall. [13] Some Gaelic men's names require further changes when used in a byname, but only requires the genitive. Further details are available in the article Quick and Easy Gaelic Names. http://www.medievalscotland.org/scotnames/quickgaelicbynames/ [14] The sound \gh\ is related to \kh\ exactly as \gale\ is to \kale\; \gh\ is a sound not found in English, except perhaps in the expression of disgust, "Ugh!" (note should not rhyme with ). [15] Black, s.nn. Ranald, Macranald, Ranaldson, Reginaldus, Reginaldson, Allanson, Mackessock, Macnair. [16] If you would like a few names that would be especially good choices for your father's name, we can particularly recommend (spelled after about 1200), Donnchad (later ), (), and (). They were all common in early Irish records, and we have found them in use for several centuries among Scottish Gaels. If you would like more information on any of these names, please write again; note that certain changes will be required in any of these names in order to render them in the appropriate form for a feminine byname. [17] Black, s.n. Balwany. [18] Malory, Thomas, "Le Morte Darthur: Sir Thomas Malory's Book of King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table", volume 1, ed. Charles Keller (WWW: University of Virginia Library Electronic Text Center, 1999), book 1, chapter 1. http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new?id=Mal1Mor&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=1&division=div1 [19] West, G. D., _An Index of Proper Names in French Arthurian Verse Romances 1150-1300_, Univ. of Toronto Romance Series 15 (Toronto:Univ. of Toronto Press, 1969, SBN 8020 5226 6), s.n. Yg(u)erne. [20] Krossa, Sharon L. (Effric neyn Kenyeoch vc Ralte), "Scottish Gaelic Given Names for Women", (WWW: Privately published, 2001), s.n. Christian/Christine. http://www.MedievalScotland.org/scotnames/gaelicwomen/ [21] Room, Adrian, _Dictionary of Irish Place-Names_ (Belfast: Appletree Press, 1994), s.n. Loughanure. [22] Dickinson, William Croft, ed., _Early Records of the Burgh of Aberdeen: 1317, 1398-1407_, vol. XLIX, _Publications of The Scottish History Society_ (Edinburgh: The Scottish History Society, Third Series, 1957).