ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 3207 http://www.s-gabriel.org/3207 ************************************ 30 Oct 2006 From: Aryanhwy merch Catmael Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel! You wanted to know if , , or are suitable names for a Scots man living in the mid 14th to mid 15th centuries, and whether , which you found in a novel, is an authentic surname for this period. You also asked for information about armorial designs from this period. Here is what we have found. Any of the three given names are fine; in the 13th and 14th centuries we find the names , , , , and , and in 1435 we find one . [1,2] As you're probably aware, chosing a surname from a modern novel is generally not a reliable way of picking an authentic medieval name. As it happens, is a modern Irish surname. The root of is the Gaelic byname (where the slash represents an acute accent over the previous letter). [4] A Gaelic byname would not be appropriate for a Lowland Scots man, and so we recommend that you pick a different byname. You can find suitable choices in reference [1]. Scottish armory has been studied in detail and so we can give you quite a bit of information about typical patterns and charges. [3] - animate charges are in 40% of 13th-15th C armory, and 31% of 14th-16th C armory; heads of animals make up 38% of the 31%, and lions make up 42% of the 31%. - buckles, cinquefoils, escutcheons, and roses are found with some frequency - cinquefoils are found with some frequency - the most common types of crosses are crosslet, formy, and moline; crosses crosslet most common as secondary charges, and crosses moline as primaries. - escallops are found with some frequency, often as tertiaries - mascles are common as primaries, secondaries, and tertiaries. - mullets are extremely common; of arms with mullets 17% have them as primaries, 20% as secondaries, and 42% as tertiaries. - ordinaries are often checky. The fess is the most common in 14th-16th C armory (15%). - otter's heads are more common than elsewhere, though still rare. The most common overall compositional elements for Scots armory are: [3] - sole ordinary with secondary charge group (18%) - group of multiple non-ordinary primary charges (16%) - single non-ordinary primary (10%) - single ordinary with tertiary (9%) - single ordinary (8%) The most popular tincture in 14th-16th C Scots armory is argent (66%), with the most popular color begin gules (41%). [3] 42% of fields are plain argent, and 21% of tincture combinations are argent and sable, and 23% argent and gules. [3] Based on this, we recommend designs like the following as being very typical of Scottish style: Argent, a fess between three X gules Argent, on a fess between three X gules, three Y argent Argent, a fess checky gules and Or between three X gules Here "X" can be filled in with any of crosses crosslet, buckles, cinquefoils, escutcheons, mascles, mullets, or roses, and "Y" with any of escallops, mascles, or mullets. 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. Additional research and commentary on this letter was provided by Maridonna Benvenuti and Adelaide de Beaumont. For the Academy, -Aryanhwy merch Catmael, 30 October 2006 -- References: [1] Symon Freser of Lovat, "13th & 14th Century Scottish Names" (WWW: Academy of Saint Gabriel, 1996). http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/symonFreser/scottish14/ [2] Black, George F., _The Surnames of Scotland: Their Origin, Meaning and History_, (New York: The New York Public Library, 1986), s.n. Arthur [3] Zenobia Naphtali, "Regional Style" in Proceedings of the Known World Heraldic Symposium, 1996, Montgomery, Alabama (SCA, Inc., 1996). [4] MacLysaght, Edward, _The Surnames of Ireland_ (Dublin: Irish Academic Press Ltd., 1985, ISBN 0-7165-2366-3), s.n. (Mac) Kilgannon