ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 3117 http://www.s-gabriel.org/3117 ************************************ ************************************************* * * * NOTE: Later research turned up additional * * information relevant to this report. * * See the end of the letter for details. * * * ************************************************* 1 Jul 2006 From: Aryanhwy merch Catmael Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel! You asked if we could recommend a given name which sounds like or and which would be appropriate for a Viking-era Old Norse woman. You also asked for information about appropriate bynames. Here is the information we have found. We can recommend a name which sounds somewhat similar to : . is recorded in Iceland and Norway in the late 10th century and remained in use at least in Norway until the early 16th century. [3,4,5] It's a fine choice for your given name, and was pronounced roughly \KAHT-lah\ in your period. It is unlikely that any form of was used in Old Norse during your period. is a feminine form of the masculine name , which was not a native Old Norse name. Indeed, when we researched before, we found no form of it in the standard comprehensive references for medieval Icelandic, Norwegian, and Danish names. [1,2] One collection of Old Norse names does include , but we suspect that the original source referred to a foreigner, possibly one of the two 12th century antipopes who took the name Victor IV. [3] It's therefore even more unlikely that was used during your period. A Viking woman in your period would have had a patronymic byname, e.g., one identifying her as her father's daugher. If you'd like to chose a name for your father, we recommend that you browse the following article: "Viking Names found in the Landnamabok" http://www.ellipsis.cx/~liana/names/norse/landnamabok.html In particular, all of the names in blue are appropriate for your period. You can find information on how to form a patronymic byname in this article: "A Simple Guide to Creating Old Norse Names" http://www.ellipsis.cx/~liana/names/norse/sg-viking.html If you have any questions or would like to double check the byname that you've chosen, please write us again and we'll be happy to help. We hope that this letter has been useful to you; research and commentary was provided by Juliana de Luna, Maridonna Benvenuti, Ursula Georges, Mari neyn Brian, and Talan Gwynek. For the Academy, -Aryanhwy merch Catmael 01 July 2006 -- References: [1] Lind, E.H., _Norsk-Isla"ndska Dopnamn ock Fingerade Namn fra*n Medeltiden_ (Uppsala & Leipzig: 1905-1915, sup. Oslo, Uppsala and Kobenhavn: 1931). (Here stands for a-umlaut, and stands for an with a small circle directly above it.) [2] Knudsen Gunnar, Marius Kristiansen, & Rikard Hornby, _Danmarks Gamle Personnavne_, Vol. I: Fornavne (Copenhagen: 1936-48). [3] Fleck, G. (aka Geirr Bassi Haraldsson), _The Old Norse Name_, Studia Marklandica (series) (Olney, Maryland: Yggsalr Press, 1977). [4] Lind, op. cit., s.n. Katla. [5] The name itself was adopted into Old Norse as (where the slash represents an acute accent over the previous letter). However, we are not recommending this for your period because the earliest example that we've found is in 1300. [6] [6] Academy of S. Gabriel Report #2434 http://www.s-gabriel.org/2434 ---------------------- Correction by Aryanhwy, 09 April 2007: Removed a superfluous explanation of the edh from footnote [5].