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Greetings,
Here's the information we have on the name "Cynara the Grey of Thorncoomb."
"Cynara" is not a Welsh name. It is found in the work of the Roman poet Horace, but it's not clear that "Cynara" was a real name even in ancient Rome. 18th-century poetry uses Cynara because of this reference. We have no evidence that "Cynara" was used in any language in the Middle Ages or Renaissance.
If you're interested in information about Welsh names, look at our Web page on 13th-century Welsh names at
http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/welsh13.html
We found two towns called "Thorncombe" in Dorset, in southeast England. In period, they had a variety of spellings, including
Turnecumb 1234
Tornecumba c.1140
Thorncumbe 1291
We looked at other place-names which include the element "cumbe" and found that over 90% of the examples from the 12th and 13th centuries use the spelling "cumbe." The others use the spelling "combe." Thus, we recommend using one of the spellings above.
"Thorncumbe" is only appropriate with an English name. For a list of English women's name from your period, look at the Web page
http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/reaney/
Talan Gwynek, Tangwystl verch Morgant Glasvryn, Arval Benicoeur, Zenobia Naphtali, and Rouland Carre contributed to this letter.
We hope this has been helpful. If you would like us to do further research, please let us know.
In service,
Alan Fairfax,
Academy of S. Gabriel