ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 3028 http://www.s-gabriel.org/3028 ************************************ 17 Apr 2005 From: Aryanhwy merch Catmael (no address) Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel! You wanted to know if or is an appropriate name for an Irish woman living in the 16th century. Here is the information we have found. Your given name is fine. , , and are all found in Ireland in the 16th century. [1] In this letter we'll uses a slash to represent an acute accent over the previous letter. The name was pronounced approximately \ROASH\, where \OA\ is the vowel in . [2] is a modern English family name that derives from the Gaelic clan-affiliation surname 'member of the O Huigin clan'. The Gaelic clan name, which was used in the 16th century, derived from an early medieval masculine given name ; the in is an artifact of Irish grammar. However, is the masculine form, which was used only in men's names. The equivalent for a woman's name is , which literally means 'daughter of O Huigin' and was understand to mean 'female member of the O Huigin clan'. [4] This name would have been pronounced roughly \EEN-y@n ee IG-een^\, where \@\ is the sound of in or , and \n^\ is the sound of in French 'mountain'. [5] is a fine choice for your name, though in at least some circumstances in your period, Irish women were identified as their father's daughters, using the father's given name. For example, Ro/ise, daughter of Conall O/ hUigi/n, would normally have been identified as . It would be more authentic in many circumstances to include your father's given name in your full name. [6] You can find a list of suitable names for your father at: "Index of Names in Irish Annals: Masculine Given Names: 1501-1600" http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/mari/AnnalsIndex/Masculine/1501-1600.shtml If you pick a name for your father, we'll be happy to help with the grammatical details of the byname and give a pronunciation. We hope that this letter has been useful to you and that you won't hesitate to write us again if any part was unclear or if you have further questions. Research and commentary on this letter was provided by Maridonna Benvenuti, Arval Benicoeur, Talan Gwynek, Mari neyn Brian, and Barak Raz. For the Academy, -Aryanhwy merch Catmael, 17 April 2005 -- References: [1] Mari Elspeth nic Bryan, "Index of Names in Irish Annals" (WWW: Academy of S. Gabriel, 2001-2002). http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/mari/AnnalsIndex/ [2] This can be represented more exactly in Kirshenbaum ASCII IPA as [ro:s^]. [3] [3] Blaheta, Don, "Representation of IPA with ASCII" (WWW: Blahedo.org) http://www.blahedo.org/ascii-ipa.html [4] Woulfe, Patrick, _Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall: Irish Names and Surnames_ (Kansas City: Irish Genealogical Foundation). s.n. O/ hUigen [5] This can be represented more exactly in Kirshenbaum ASCII IPA as [i: Ig^i:n^]. [3] [6] O'Brien, Kathleen M., "Irish Names", handout from Known World Heraldic Symposium 2003 and Ansteorran Heralds & Scribes Symposium 2004. (Self-published, 2003-2004), p. 4