ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 2549
http://www.s-gabriel.org/2549
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16 Jul 2002
From: (Josh Mittleman)
Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel!
You asked for our help choosing a name appropriate for a 13th or 14th
century Coptic Christian man during the middle Mamluk period. You
specifically asked about the saint's names <Michael> and <Menas> and asked
whether it would be appropriate to use a standard Arabic naming pattern.
We apologize for the time it has taken to complete our answer to your
questions; here is what we have found.
We don't know a great deal about Coptic naming customs, but we think we
have found enough information to answer your question.
General information we found about the history of the Copts and their
language suggests that a Copt of your period would likely have spoken
Arabic as well as Coptic, and would likely have been identified by an
Arabic-style name at least in that language [1]. You can find discussions
of Arabic naming patterns in these two articles:
Andalusian Names: Arabs in Spain
http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/juliana/andalusia/
Arabic Naming Practices and Names List
http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/daud/arabic-naming/
A study of medieval Coptic names shows that in addition to native Egyptian
names, they used Old and New Testament names, as well as names adopted from
Arabic, Greek, Aramaic, and Latin [5]. Unfortunately, we only found one
volume of this work, not including the part that covers names beginning
with <M->. However, a sample of the names listed is useful. The numbers
are the centuries in which the name was recorded:
Names of Hebrew and origin
Aaron 6-9
Abeia 7-8
Abel 6-7
Abener 6/7
Abraham 6-13
Abisalom 8
Gabriel 13
Names of Greek origin
Abianos? 4
Agathon ?
Agathonikos 4-6
Agathos 8-9
Athanasios 13
Anthinos 12
Arsenios 12
Georgi 13
Georgios 13
Names of Arabic origin
Abbalmine 13
Abdella 8-9
Abderahman 8
Aboulam 8
Aboupilal 8
Abros 11?
Abou Saal ?
Aboussoror 9-11
Apoulioumen 12
Gorgis 13
Other origin or origin not known
Abbi 10
Abibo ?
Abedda ? (Aramaic?)
Ablarion 2
Abion 6
Abenati 8
Abesemon ?
Abast 8/9
Abixer 8/9
Agau ?
Agabos ?
Ammonios 12 (Egyptian)
Biktor 12 (Latin, "Victor")
We have found references, in modern spellings, to an 11th century Coptic
bishop <Michael> and a 12th century Copt of the same name [6, 7]. We do
not know how the name was spelled, but we are confident that some form of
the name was in use among the Copts close to your period. The citation
above of <Gabriel> in 13th century Coptic makes it easy to believe that
<Michael> remained in use in your period. We have also found modern
references to 7th to 10th century Copts named <Mina> [7, 8, 9], which
appears to be the Coptic or Arabic form of the Greek name <Me:nas> [10].
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 Adelaide de Beaumont, Tangwystyl
verch Morgant Glasvryn, Ursula Georges, Juliana de Luna, Talan Gwynek,
Teceangl Bach, Maridonna Benvenuti, and Aryanhwy merch Catmael
For the Academy,
Arval Benicoeur
16 Jul 2002
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References
[1] Bi-lingual Coptic-Arabic liturgical manuscripts first appear in the
second half of the 11th century, and the first Egyptian Christian texts
entirely in Arabic were written in the 13th century. However, Coptic
remained in use in everyday life until the 15th century throughout Egypt
and the late 16th century in the south [2, 3, 4].
[2] "The Christian Coptic Orthodox Church Of Egypt" (WWW: The Coptic
Network, accessed 18 Jun 2002).
http://www.coptic.net/EncyclopediaCoptica/
[3] Hany N. Takla, "The History of the Coptic Language" (WWW: privately
published, 1996). The source gives names in the Coptic alphabet; we have
transliterated them to the Roman alphabet as best we could.
http://www.stshenouda.com/coptlang/copthist.htm#Coptic11
[4] George Khoury, "The Arabic Christian Literature" (WWW: Al-Bushra,
accessed 18 Jun 2002). The discussion mentions the 10th century <Severus
Ibn Al-Muqaffa>, bishop of al-Ushmunain (Upper Egypt) and 11th century
<Mawhub ibn Mansur>, deacon of Alexandria, as well as other medieval Coptic
Christian prelates with Arabic-style names. This suggests that at least
some Copts were using Arabic name forms even this early. This page also
mentions an 11th century Michael, bishop of Tinnis.
http://www.al-bushra.org/arbhrtg/arbxtn01.htm
[5] Gustav Heuser, Die Kopten (Heidelberg : F. Bilabel, 1938). Covers the
3rd to 16th centuries, but the vast majority of citations are from roughly
the 7th to 9th centuries. Only given names are listed, not full name
structures.
[6] Gustav Heuser, Die Personennamen der Kopten (Leipzig: Dieterich, 1929)
(also listed as Die koptischen Personennamen agyptischen Ursprungs). The
author seems to be primarily interested in linguistically Coptic names; he
deals only briefly with names adopted from other sources. However, he does
seem to discuss name structures.
[7] Departure of St. Mina, Bishop of Tamai, in the Coptic Synexarion (book
of saints) (WWW: icopts.com, accessed 16 Jul 2002). This bishop lived at
the time of the 46th Pope of Alexandria, i.e. in the 8th century.
http://www.icopts.com/syncx/syncx_details.php?m=Hatour&d=7
[8] Martyrdom of St.Mina the Monk. in the Coptic Synexarion (book
of saints) (WWW: icopts.com, accessed 16 Jul 2002). The text places this
man at the time of the Arab conquest of Egypt, in the 6th century.
http://www.icopts.com/syncx/syncx_details.php?m=Amshir&d=17
[9] The Seat of St. Mark (WWW: St. Peter & St. Paul Coptic Orthodox Church,
accessed 16 Jul 2002). In section 3, it mentioned Pope Mina II who was
enthroned in 956 AD.
[10] Fraser, P.M., and E. Matthews, "The Lexicon of Greek Personal Names"
(WWW: Oxford University, 1998). The database includes a fair number of
examples of <Me:nas>, where <e:> represents the Greek letter eta.
http://www.lgpn.ox.ac.uk/