ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 3376 http://www.s-gabriel.org/3376 ************************************ 4 Jan 2010 From: Gunnvor Silfraharr Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You wanted to know if is an authentic name for an Irish Gaelic man living in the 15th century, or whether you'd need to add an or before . First, we'd like to apologize for the time this letter has taken; we hope the information is still of use to you. appears to be a misspelling of the name (where the slash (/) represents an acute accent over the previous letter). Although this name seems to have been much more popular before the 12th century, we did find one instance of it from the early 15th century, so it is certainly a possible name for a 15th century Irishman. [1] During the 15th century, was pronounced roughly \FU*-lahn\, where represents the vowel you get by by trying to pronounce the in with your lips positioned as if you were saying as in . is a modern form of a name that we find in the 7th and early 8th centuries. [1,2] During this period, the appropriate spelling is . Because we do not have any examples of this name from your desired period, we cannot recommend its use as authentic for the 15th century. (Note that there are many names that were used in early Ireland that fell out of use and were only revived in modern times, so the presence of the modern form does not imply that the name was also used in the 15th century.) We can suggest two alternatives. If keeping your persona in the 15th century is most important to you, then we can recommend a similar name to which was used in the 15th century: . [1] You could combine the name with the given name in two ways. The first is to make the name of your father; this would be done by adding before it and putting into the genitive case, e.g., (pronounced roughly \m@k MUR-@-kh@\; here and elsewhere in this letter represents the sound of in and represents the slightly rasping sound of in Scottish 'lake' or German 'oh' and ). The second is to use it as part of a clan membership byname, which is done by adding before in the genitive case, e.g., (pronounced roughly \o MUR-@-kh@\). Either of these is appropriate for the 15th century. If, on the other hand, keeping is more important to you, then we recommend that you place your persona in the 8th century. We have a number of examples of , the earlier period form of , from then. [1] Clan bynames (including those that use ) did not develop until the 10th century, so if you place your persona in the 8th century we recommend that you use as part of a patronymic byname. For this period the appropriate form is , where is the genitive case of . would be pronounced something like \FEY-lahn m@k MOOR-kh@n\, where represents the vowel in and the sound of the word . 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 Aryanhwy merch Catmael, Brian Dorcha ua Connail, Talan Gwynek, Juliana de Luna, and Mari neyn Brian. For the Academy, Coblaith Mhuimhneach and Gunnvor silfraharr 04 January 2010 ---------------------------------------------- References [1] Mari Elspeth nic Bryan, "Index of Names in Irish Annals: Masculine Given Names" (WWW: Academy of S. Gabriel, 2001-2006). http://www.medievalscotland.org/kmo/AnnalsIndex/Masculine/ [2] O/ Corra/in, Donnchadh and Fidelma Maguire, _Irish Names_ (Dublin: The Lilliput Press, 1990); s.n. Murchu/.