ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 3357 http://www.s-gabriel.org/3357 ************************************ 17 Apr 2009 From: Ursula Georges Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked for our opinion of or as an 8th to 10th century Norse given name as well as a byname based on the men's name or . Before we begin, we'd like to apologize for the amount of time this letter has taken. We hope this information is still useful to you. During your period the Scandinavian language was beginning to divide into two major dialects, Old West Norse (OWN) and Old East Norse (OEN); the differences were still small, but there do seem to have been some differences in the names used in the two dialect areas. Roughly speaking, OWN was spoken in Norway, Iceland, and places colonized from there, like Greenland and Orkney, while OEN was spoken in Denmark, most of Sweden, and places colonized from there, mostly to the east. [1] We have researched the feminine given name in the past. In our research, we found references for in both the western and eastern dialect areas within the period you are looking for. This is a fine choice for any part of Scandinavia you wish to be from. [2] The feminine given name only appears in OWN as a name for a mythological character. (Here, the forward slash represents an acute accent over the preceding letter). This name does appear in a few Swedish runic inscriptions, in a form transliterated in Latin letters. It does not seem to have been common, but it would be suitable for someone from the eastern part of Scandinavia in your period. [3] The masculine given name is found a couple of times in 10th- century Iceland, where it remained in occasional use at least through the 14th century. It has not been found in Norway, but there is a possible runic instance from Sweden. [4, 5] To form a byname indicating that you are the daughter of a man named , you put the father's name into the genitive (possessive) case. In English this would turn it into , but in Old Norse it becomes , and the byname in full is , literally 'Starri's daughter'. [6] We have found only one instance of the masculine given name , in a Swedish runic inscription. It seems to have been extremely rare, and we have no evidence for it in the western dialect area. It isn't completely out of the question for the eastern region, but even there would be a better choice. If you decide to use it anyway, you'll need to know that its genitive is , so that the patronymic byname is . is a fine name for your period, especially for someone living in western Scandinavia. However, this is a standardized scholarly spelling using Latin letters; in your period the name would have been written in runes. The runic futhark (alphabet) changed somewhat over time and also varied a bit from place to place. Some of the more important variants can be seen here: http://www.arild-hauge.com/nruner.htm. The futhark labelled 'NORSK-SVENSKE RÖKRUNER CA 800 - 900' would be reasonably suitable for most of your period and for most parts of Scandinavia. Runic spellings are a bit different from the standard Latin-letter spellings. For instance, double letters were rarely written as such. You'll also notice that there are no runes corresponding to the letters and , among others. Thus, the name is actually spelled with the runes for . (Here represents the tenth rune, not the fourth.) As for the less likely possibilities, the patronymic is written with the runes for , and the name is written with the runes for . (Here again stands for the tenth rune, and stands for the fifth rune, not the one labelled .) Note that these spellings are used only when the name is written in runes; when it's written in Latin letters, the standard scholarly spellings are your best choice. I 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 Talan Gwynek, Ursula Georges, Juliana de Luna, Aryanhwy merch Catmael and Rohese de Dinan. For the Academy, Elizabeth Turner de Carlisle 17 April 2009 ----------------------------------------------------- References [1] Talan Gwynek, "A Very Brief History of the Scandinavian Languages" (WWW: Academy of S. Gabriel, 2002) http://www.s- gabriel.org/names/talan/scandinavianlang.html [2] Academy of St. Gabriel Report #3074 (WWW, Academy of S. Gabriel, 2005) http://www.s-gabriel.org/3074 [3] Gunnvo^r silfraha/rr, "Old Norse Women's Names" (WWW: The Viking Answer Lady, 2008) http://www.vikinganswerlady.com/ONWomensNames.shtml [4] Lind, E.H., _Norsk-Isla:ndska Dopnamn ock Fingerade Namn fra*n Medeltiden_ (Uppsala & Leipzig: 1905-1915, sup. Oslo, Uppsala and Kobenhavn: 1931). s.n. Starri. [5] Peterson, Lena, "Nordiskt runnamnslexikon" (WWW: Institute for Dialectology, Onomastics and Folklore Research, 2001) http://www.sofi.se/SOFIU/runlex/ s.nn. , . [6] Fleck, G. (aka Geirr Bassi Haraldsson), _The Old Norse Name_, Studia Marklandica (series) (Olney, Maryland: Yggsalr Press, 1977). [7] Peterson, s.nn. .