ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1844 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1844 ************************************ From: "Braddon Giles" 3 Jan 2000 Greetings form the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked for our assistance in determining a historically accurate name for a woman of Norman descent from 12th century Sicily, around the time of Roger II. You suggested , and wanted to know what languages were spoken there at that time. You said you want the name to mean "Margaret (or Marjorie) from Palermo in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies". You told us that your grandmother used it as your nickname; we can't guess where she got it. The best we can do is to discuss the Italian versions of and that appear in our sources. is an English adaptation of , a French pet form of . It is found in England by 1194, [2] so it is reasonable to believe that the Normans might have carried it to Sicily, too. However we do not have any evidence that this actually happened or that the name was adopted into the Sicilian dialect of Italian. We have found the name in 13th to 15th century northern and central Italy as and [3, 4, 5]. We believe it was probably used in Sicily in your period and we recommend these spellings. We believe your surname is almost right. In northern and central Italy, surnames based on place names used rather than , so we recommend . We don't have any sources for medieval Sicilian names, so we aren't sure that this is the right choice for that region; but it's our best guess based on the information we have. Note that surnames based on the names of large places were usually used by people who had moved away from their homes. The area that became known as the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies was united by the Normans in the 11th century, and simply known as The Kingdom of Sicily. The two areas were divided in 1282 between the Angevin (French) dynasty on the mainland and the Aragonese (Spanish) dynasty on the island, both of which claimed the title of King of Sicily. It was in 1443 that Alfonso V reunited them and took the title of "King of both Sicilies". Thus, the term "Kingdom of the Two Sicilies" was not used until several centuries after your period; and we have seen no evidence even in the 15th century that this complicated phrase was ever used as part of a person's name. However, you already have the elements to make an excellent name for your time and requirements. Either or would be a good name for a woman from Sicily in the 12th century. As an important trading centre in the Mediteranian, Sicily has had much contact with other cultures. The population of 12th century Sicily include ethnic Italians, Greeks, French, Arabs, and Jews, all of whom had communities where they spoke their own languages. Government was probably conducted primarily in a mixture of Latin, Greek, and Norman French, and commerce in a mixture of all these language and others. [6] We hope this letter has been useful. Please write to 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, Maridonna Benvenuti, Tangwystyl verch Morgant Glasvryn, Arval d'Espas Nord, Raquel Buenaventura, Walraven van Nijmegen, Margaret Makafee, Juliana de Luna and Talan Gwynek. For the Academy, Giles Leabrook. 03/ Jan /2000 _____________________________________ Bibliography. [1] Withycombe, E.G., _The Oxford Dictionary of English Christian Names_, 3rd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988). Marjorie [2] Arval Benicoeur, "Feminine Given Names from Thirteenth Century Perugia" (WWW: J. Mittleman, 1997) http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/arval/perugia/ [3] Arval Benicoeur, "Feminine Given Names from the Online Catasto of Florence of 1427" (WWW: J. Mittleman, 1998) http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/arval/catasto [4] Rhian Lyth, "Italian Renaissance Women's Names" (WWW: J. Mittleman, 1996) http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/italian.html [5] Falcandus, Hugo, "The History of the Tyrants of Sicily by 'Hugo Falcandus' 1153-69", ed. G. A. Loud and T. E. Widemann (Manchester University Press, 1998).