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Greetings from the Academy of S. Gabriel!
You asked about the Gaelic name <Eilidh>, and in particular whether the existence of several prior registrations would ensure its current acceptability.
The second question is quickly answered: prior registration is not evidence of current acceptability. There are several reasons for
(1) In the early days of the College of Arms, names were registered only as adjuncts to armory and were subject to almost no authenticity requirements. [1] Over the years they have been subject to increasingly strict scrutiny in respect of historical authenticity.
(2) More extensive research has on occasion shown that a name once thought to have been historically authentic is not.
(3) For many years the Rules for Submissions have contained a clause allowing the registration of part of one's modern name unless it is intrusively modern. [2]
(4) Another provision of the Rules for Submissions allows one to register a name or armory element already registered by a member of one's immediate (modern) family, even if it is no longer generally registerable. [3]
(5) Occasionally Laurel simply makes a mistake. Once a name has been registered to someone, the registration cannot be retracted, but Laurel isn't required to repeat the mistake.
Thus, a prior registration of a name really shows only that that particular instance of the name was registerable at that particular time.
<Eilidh> is a Scottish Gaelic diminutive of <Eibhlin>, a name which it has now largely supplanted. [4] We have not been able to discover how old it is, but we think that at most it might go back to the 16th century.
Different languages have different techniques for forming diminutives. In English one common technique is to add an \ee\ sound to some part of the full name: <Billy>, <Janey>, etc. The same is true of Scots, a language very closely related to English that was the language of the Scottish royal court from the 14th century until after the end of the SCA period. Gaelic also adds suffixes to form diminutives, but the suffixes are quite different: <-ag> (feminine) and <-an> (masculine) are perhaps the most common. [5]
This indicates that <Eilidh>, pronounced roughly \AY-lee\, is probably either a modern Gaelic diminutive formed in imitation of English practice, or a Gaelicization of some English pet name similar to <Ellie>. It is the second of these possibilities that leaves open a chance that <Eilidh> is period: we know that English and Scots were forming \ee\ diminutives by the 16th century, and it's just possible that a few were borrowed into Gaelic at that time. Some known Scots examples are <Bessie> 1529, <Malie> 1567 (from <Mary>), and <Wylly> 1454, but none of these involves a Gaelic name. [5]
This is very speculative, however, and we cannot recommend <Eilidh> for serious historical re-creation. <Eibhlin> is a much safer choice. This is actually a Gaelic borrowing of Norman <Avelina>, though it was popularly associated with the name <Helen> and was Anglicized and Latinized as <Helena>, <Elena>, etc. [6, 7] We know that the name became quite popular in Ireland, and we know that the Gaelic-speaking cultures of Ireland and Scotland used many of the same names. Because there are very few period Scottish Gaelic records, we don't have an actual Scottish citation of the name in this form, but it's likely that some instances of <Elena>, etc. in Latin or Scots documents actually represent <Eibhlin>. For instance, when we find a woman whose name was recorded as <Elyne> c.1300 and whose father and brother bore Gaelic names, we may reasonably guess that her name was really <Eibhlin>. ([5] s.n. GARTNAIT)
Whatever you decide, you will eventually want some sort of byname, i.e., a second name that distinguishes you from other people with the same given name. Much the most common type of Gaelic byname is the patronymic, one that identifies you as the daughter of your father. If your father's name were <Diarmaid> (pronounced roughly \JAR-mahtch\), for instance, and yours were <Eibhlin>, you would probably be known as <Eibhlin inghean Diarmaid> 'Eibhlin daughter of Diarmaid', pronounced roughly \AYV-leen NEE-yen JAR-mahtch\.
The other main possibility is a simple descriptive nickname, e.g., <Eibhlin Bhuidhe>, pronounced roughly \AYV-leen VOO-yeh\, where \OO\ represents the sound of <oo> in <pull>; the byname means 'fair, golden'.
Effrick neyn Kenyeoch and Arval Benicoeur also contributed to this letter. We hope that it has been helpful; please write again if you have any questions or would like help in coming up with a suitable byname.
For the Academy,
Talan Gwynek
[1] The early concerns were conflict with other SCA names and pretense. The first wasn't a problem as long as the Society remained very small. The second is exemplified by the text of the 8/72 return of the armory accompanying the name <Eric Odinsson>: 'Let him submit a history form documenting whose son he is, or change his name'.
[2] This allowance applies only to the exact form of the modern name, and it must be used as the corresponding part of the SCA name. Someone whose legal given name was <Wendy> -- a name apparently first used in the play 'Peter Pan' (1904) -- could register <Wendy> as an SCA given name. She could not register it as a byname, and she could not register <Wendie>. The given name <Legend> was recently (3/97) ruled intrusively modern.
[3] There are some technical limitations on this allowance. Basically the new submission must not break any rules that aren't already broken by the registered one.
[4] Morgan, Peadar. Ainmean Chloinne (Broadford, Skye, Scotland: Taigh na Teud, 1989).
[5] Black, George F. The Surnames of Scotland: Their Origin, Meaning and History (New York: The New York Public Library, 1986).
[6] O/ Corráin, Donnchadh and Fidelma Maguire. Irish Names (Dublin: The Lilliput Press, 1990). (The slashes stand for acute accents over the preceding vowels.)
[7] Woulfe, Patrick. Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall: Irish Names and Surnames (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1967 [1923]).
Correction, 18 Oct 2001, Arval: After a word ending in n, like inghean, the letter D does not lenite.