ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 3378 http://www.s-gabriel.org/3378 ************************************ 29 Nov 2008 From: Julia Smith Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked about the suitability of the names or for a Basque woman living in Viscaya or Navarra sometime between 1300 and 1550. This is what we have found. First, a quick note about Basque: while Basque speakers have lived in this area for a very long time, documents were not written in Basque until close to 1600. [1] Thus, most of our records of the names of Basque speakers before 1600 are written down in Spanish or some other form of Romance. That means that there's no way to guess at appropriate Basque spellings for this period, because Basque is not being spelled in this period. In the handful of sixteenth century Basque language letters which survive, names seem mostly to have been spelled in accordance with Spanish conventions. [2], [3] is found frequently elsewhere in Spain, but we could find no evidence for its use in Navarra or Vizcaya and therefore cannot recommend it for you. However, while we have good sources for the area in the fourteenth century, we have relatively few sources for the area in the fifteenth and early sixteenth century and cannot rule out the possibility that it would be fine towards the end of your period. is found quite frequently in fourteenth century Navarra and Viscaya. [4], [5] The spelling follows the standards of modern Basque, and does not seem to have been used before 1600. All versions of the name that we could find after 1300 use the spelling . We recommend you use this spelling. The byname , meaning 'blue eyed,'is found only in 1258, but there's no reason to think it inappropriate for the following century. [5] In summary, is a lovely name for a fourteenth century Basque speaking woman living in Viscaya or Navarra. It may well be plausible for a later period, but we do not have the evidence to support this (especially for the form and spelling of the byname). We hope this letter has been useful to you. If you have any questions or would like further information, please don't hesitate to write to us again. Aryanhwy merch Catmael, Elizabeth Turner de Carlisle, Adelaide de Beaumont, and Talan Gwynek assisted me in researching and writing this report. For the Academy, Juliana de Luna 29 November 2008 [1] Trask, R. L. "Etymological Dictionary of Basque," Electronic document, 2008, http://www.sussex.ac.uk/linguistics/documents/lxwp23-08_edb.pdf [2] Lopez Martin, I, "Basque Manuscripts," Electronic document, 2008, http://win.straatvaart.com/collection/Basque.htm [3] Mallea Olaetxe, Joxe "The Oldest Letter in Basque (1537)," Electronic document, 2008, http://www.buber.net/Basque/History/jm_letter.html [4] Carrasco Pe/rez, Juan _La Poblacio/n de Navarra en el Siglo XIV_ (Pamplona, Spain: Ediciones Universidad de Navarra, S.A, 1973). [5] Karen Larsdatter, "Basque Onomastics of the Eighth to Sixteenth Centuries," Electronic document, 2008, http://larsdatter.com/basque/index.htm. Note that this document includes both names used by people living in Basque-speaking areas and names of Basque origin used throughout the Iberian peninsula. As such, it should be used cautiously when creating a name.