Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 424

Academy of Saint Gabriel Report 424

This report is available at http://www.s-gabriel.org/424

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Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel!

Here's the information that we've found on 10th-century Bohemian naming in general and on the name "Karl" in particular.

By the 6th century Bohemia had been populated by Slavic tribes, and in the 10th century the Bohemian population was still largely Slavic; the Czechs were the dominant tribe. At that time Bohemia had considerable contact with Bavaria to the west, and there seem to have been a number of Saxon (German) churchmen in Bohemia, but it appears that Germans were still quite rare. (1, 2) Thus, most Bohemian names from that period were probably Slavic. In the Bohemian royal house, for example, we find such names as "Svatopluk" and "Wratislav", though these may be modernized spellings. (3)

The name "Karl" was used in Germany, but it was rare except among the higher nobility. (4, 5) A German in 10th-century Bohemia would most likely have been a churchman or perhaps a travelling merchant of some sort and therefore unlikely to have been named "Karl".

We think that your best bet would be to find a history of Bohemia and see what kinds of names you find, bearing in mind that they are likely to have been modernized a bit. Unfortunately, there doesn't appear to be a lot of information on 10th-century Bohemia. A search turned up "A History of the Czechs and Slovaks" by R. W. Seton-Watson, but we don't know how reliable it is. The only English-language book on medieval Bohemia we found was published in 1896.

By the way, we found no evidence that "Karl" ever meant "king". However, you may have information we don't; if so, we would appreciate knowing where you found it! In German, "karl" meant "commoner" and was used with this meaning even after the time of Karl der Grosse.

I hope that this letter has been helpful.

For the Academy,

Talan Gwynek


[1] Encyclopaedia Britannica, 15th ed.

[2] Schwarz, E. 'Sudetendeutsche Familiennamen aus Vorhussitischer Zeit'. Ko:ln, Germany, 1957.

[3] Lauda, J., & Maclagan, M. 'Heraldry of the Royal Families of Europe'. New York, 1981.

[4] Socin, A. 'Mittelhochdeutsches Namenbuch'. Hildesheim, Germany, 1966 (reprint of 1903 ed.).

[5] Bahlow, H. 'Deutsches Namenlexikon'. Baden-Baden, Germany, 1985.