ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 3278 http://www.s-gabriel.org/3278 ************************************ 25 May 2007 From: Aryanhwy merch Catmael Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel! You asked for our help developing an authentic 7th or 8th century English feminine name for your wife, with the given name . Here is what we have found. We have only one example of , the name of an Anglo-Saxon saint who supposedly died c. 800. Almost nothing is known of this saint, and her existence has been questioned. According to legend, Alkelda was an Anglo-Saxon princess who was strangled by pagan Viking women during Danish raids. Alkelda is the patron of the church of Middleham and that of Giggleswick, both in York. There are no contemporary references to the saint; she is first mentioned in the late Middle Ages. [1,2] It is not clear that is a reasonable Anglo-Saxon given name. A great many Old English personal names are composed of two elements chosen from limited repertoires of first and second elements. If were an Old English name at all, it would be a two-element with first element and second element <-kelda>. There was in fact a rare Old English first element . However, no second element <-kelda> is known. Indeed, <-kelda> is not even Old English in form, and it has been suggested that the element is actually from Old Norse 'a spring, a well; a bog'. This word occurs in a number of English place-names in parts of the country where Scandinavian influence was strong. [3] It has not been found in personal names, however, and its meaning makes it very unlikely ever to have been used as a personal name element. (This also applies to its Old English cognate .) If does in fact contain this Old Norse word, it was probably originally a place-name. It has been conjectured that in this case may be a worn-down form of Old English 'holy', as in the Yorkshire place-names and 'holy well'. [3] (Here, the <:> indicates that the is long, not short.) If this is the case, then the saint may have been invented to explain the place-name. Since there is no clear evidence for as an Old English given name, we therefore recommend that your wife pick a different given name. Our best source for Anglo-Saxon feminine names in the 7th and 8th centuries for this period are various charters written in Latin. [4] The women mentioned in these charters tend to be royalty or nuns (often abbesses), and so their names cannot necessarily be taken as typical of contemporary women's naming practices. Additionally, some of the charters which purport to be from this period are actually later forgeries. Despite these difficulties, it is possible to put together a list of Old English feminine names that appear to have been in use in the 7th and 8th c. As we noted above, the charters from this period are mostly written in Latin. The treatment of Old English names in these Latin texts varies greatly. At one extreme, we find names which have been thoroughly Latinized and given Latin grammatical endings. At the other extreme, we find thoroughly Old English forms, complete with Old English grammatical endings. This means that one cannot just take the spelling of a name as it is found in the charters, as they are not in general good guides to contemporary Old English forms. For this reason, in the list below we've combined the documentary evidence with our knowledge of Old English and its history to give what we believe are appropriate standardized Old English forms for the period in question. [8] In this list, {th} represents the letter thorn, which looks like a

superimposed over a and {dh} represents the letter edh, which looks like a backwards '6' with a crossbar. {AE}bbe {AE}lffl{ae}d {AE}lf{th}ry{th} [5] {AE}{th}elburg {AE}thelfl{ae}d {AE}thelswi{th} {AE}{th}el{th}ry{th} Beorngy{th} Bucge Ceolburg Ceolfl{ae}d Cu{th}swi{dh} Cwoengy{th} Cyneburg Cynegy{th} Cyneswi{dh} Cyne{th}ry{dh} Dunne Eadburg Eanburg Eanswi{dh} Folcburg Fri{th}ogy{dh} [6] Heaburg Hereswy{dh} Hro{dh}waru Irminburg Irminhild Mildry{th} No{th}gy{th} Os{th}ry{th} S{ae}{dh}ry{dh} Seaxburg Sele{dh}ry{dh} Sigeburg Tidburg W{ae}rburg Wilno{dh} An Old English woman of this period would in almost all circumstances be identified with just a single given name, and no byname. We recommend that your wife do the same as this practice is the best re-creation for her period. [7] 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 Talan Gwynek, Maridonna Benvenuti, and Adelaide de Beaumont. For the Academy, -Aryanhwy merch Catmael, 25 May 2007 -- References: [1] "Alkelda" (WWW: Wikipedia, 13 February 2007). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alkelda [2] Kinder, Kathleen, with David Rhodes, "St. Alkelda, Giggleswick: Patron Saint" (WWW: Quantum Dot Knowledge, 1997). http://www.daelnet.co.uk/local/churches/giggleswick/alkelda/psaint.htm Both this source and [1] make minor errors in discussing the origin of the name. [3] Smith, A.H., _English Place-Name Elements_ (Cambridge: At the University Press, 1956), s.vv. ha:lig, kelda. [4] Marieke van de Dal, "Anglo-Saxon Women's Names from Royal Charters" (WWW: Academy of S. Gabriel, 2001). http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/marieke/anglosaxonfem/ [5] Miller, Sean, "Anglo-Saxon Charters" (WWW: Anglo-Saxons.net, no date), S 168. http://www.anglo-saxons.net/hwaet/?do=show&page=Charters [6] Annal 737 of the C version of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, in Jebson, Tony, "The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle" (WWW: Self-published, 1996-2006). http://asc.jebbo.co.uk/ [7] If your wife wants to register a name with the SCA College of Arms, she will need a byname in addition to a given name. Unfortunately, given the available data, we cannot offer any authentic suggestions for a byname. If your wife decides to change her period, then we may be able to offer some suggestions. [8] To a very considerable extent these standardized forms are based on the standard scholarly normalizations such as one might find in [9,10,11]. The standard normalizations, however, tend to follow (idealized) Late West Saxon practice, and in consequence some of them are a bit anachronistic for the 7th and 8th centuries. We have tried to take both this and the actual documentary forms into account in the standardized forms that we're recommending. [9] Selte/n, Bo, _The Anglo-Saxon Heritage in Middle English Personal Names_, Volumes 1 & 2. (Lund, Sweden: Royal Society of Letters at Lund, 1979). [10] Von Feilitzen, Olof, _The Pre-Conquest Personal Names of Domesday Book_ (Uppsala: 1937). [11] Jackson, Peter, ed., _Words, Names and History: Selected Writings of Cecily Clark_, (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1995).