ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 2491 http://www.s-gabriel.org/2491 ************************************ 24 Jun 2002 From: Sara Friedemann Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel! You wanted to know if or would be an appropriate name for a Jewish woman living in the 15th or 16th century, in either the Iberian peninsula or Italy. You also expressed interest in the Middle East, if we found the name there. Here is the information we have found. The masculine name does not appear to have been popular among Jews in the Iberian Peninsula during the Middle Ages. [7] We do find, however, a number of examples of the name used by Jewish men in Italy. [4,5,6] Spellings such as or reflect the Hebrew forms of the name. While a Jew might have been known as in Hebrew, he would undoubtedly have been known to his Christian neighbors with a vernacular equivalent, e.g. in Spanish or in Italian. Throughout this letter, we'll use such vernacular forms. Even in Christian cultures, though, feminine forms of are a rather late development. In Italy and France, the first evidence that we see of and other forms is in the 16th century. [1] So far, we have not found evidence for any feminine form of in the Iberian peninsula before 1600, either in Jewish or Christian cultures. Based on this, we find it unlikely that a Jewish woman in the Iberian peninsula would have been named ; we would also like to note here that the Jews were expelled from Iberia in 1492, and so it is even less likely that a Jewish woman would be living in Spain at that time. It is possible that an Italian Jewish woman could have been named , but not especially probable. We found no evidence that any feminine form of was used in the Middle East, either by Jews or Christians. 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. Research and commentary on this letter were provided by Juliana de Luna, Arval Benicoeur, Maridonna Benvenuti, Talan Gwynek, Julie Stampnitzky, Raquel Buenaventura, Adelaide de Beaumont, and Aleksandr Traveller. For the Academy, ~Aryanhwy merch Catmael --------------------------------------- References & Notes: [1] We have one 16th century example of in France [2], and 15th or 16th century examples of in Tuscany and in Lombardy. [3] [2] Perouas, L., B. Barrie\re, B., J. Boutier; J.-C. Peyronnet, & J. Tricard, _Le/onard, Marie, Jean et les Autres: Les Pre/noms en Limousin depuis un Mille/naire (Paris: E/ditions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1984). Tableau 19 on p.100. [3] De Felice, Emidio, _Dizionario dei Nomi Italiani_ (Arnoldo Mondadori Editore, Milan, 1992). s.n. Gabriele [4] Toaff, Ariel. The Jews in Umbria (vol. 2: 1435-1484; vol. 3: 1484- 1736, index). Leiden, New York, and Ko"ln: Brill, 1994). [5] Simonsohn, Shlomo. The Jews in the Duchy of Milan (Vol. 1: 1387- 1477; Vol. 2: 1477-1566; Vol. 3: 1566-1788). Jerusalem: The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1982. [6] Segre, Renata. The Jews in Piedmont (Vol. 1: 1297-1582). Jerusalem: The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities and Tel Aviv University, 1986. [7] We have found only two examples of Jewish men named in the Iberian peninsula before 1600. [8,9]. [8] Cubellis i Llorens, Josefina. The Jews of Tortosa 1373-1492: Regesta of Documents from the Archivo Histo/rico de Protocols de Tarragona (Sources for the History of Jews in Spain vol. 3). Jerusalem, 1991. [9] Francisco Sevillano olom, "Gabriel de Vallseca, carto/grafo mallorqui/n del siglo XV," in Homenaje al Dr. D. Juan Regla/ Campistol, 2 vols. (Valencia, 1975), 1:159–162.