ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 2059 http://www.s-gabriel.org/2059 ************************************ 2 May 2000 From: (Josh Mittleman) Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked whether is an appropriate name for a 13th-16th century Irish woman. This letter is a brief answer to your question. The Irish Gaelic name or was an adaptation of the English name , a pet name for . (The slash in the names represents a sharp accent mark on the preceding letter.) It was borrowed into Gaelic after the English settlement of Ireland, and was used roughly from the early 13th century [1, 2]. was pronounced \KAT-leen\, while was pronounced \KAT-@-leen\. The symbol \@\ represents a schwa, the sound of the in . (Note that neither of these names can correctly be pronounced \KATE-lin\.) or was a fairly common early-medieval Gaelic name [1, 3], but we aren't sure it was in use late enough to be compatible with . In other words, by the time a woman could have been called , there may not have been men named . If there had been one, his name would have been spelled , using the later-medieval Gaelic spelling, and pronounced \LAY-gh@-r@\. \gh\ represents a sound not used in English; it is the voiced equivalent of the rasping sound in the Scottish word and the German . Instead of being Laoghaire's daughter, you might consider being his descendent: Members of clan O/ Laoghaire are mentioned in 12th century Irish annals [4]. would be a fine name for your period. It literally means "Caitili/n, daughter of the male descendent of Laoghaire" and was understood in your period to mean "Caitili/n of clan O/ Laoghaire". It would have been pronounced \KAT-@-leen EEN-y@n ee LAY-gh@-r@\. We hope this brief letter has been useful. Please write us again if you have any questions. I was assisted in researching and writing this letter by Talan Gwynek, Mari neyn Bryan, and Tangwystyl verch Morgant Glasvryn For the Academy, Arval Benicoeur 2 May 2000 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - References [1] O/ Corra/in, Donnchadh and Fidelma Maguire, _Irish Names_ (Dublin: The Lilliput Press, 1990), s.nn. Caiteri/ona, La/egaire. [2] Woulfe, Patrick, _Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall: Irish Names and Surnames_ (Kansas City: Irish Genealogical Foundation), s.n. Caitli/n. [3] Jones, Heather Rose (aka Tangwystyl verch Morgant Glasvryn), "100 Most Popular Men's Names in Early Medieval Ireland" (WWW: J. Mittleman, 1998). http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/tangwystyl/irish100 [4] Annals of Tigernach, in the Corpus of Electronic Texts (WWW: University College Cork, Cork, Ireland, 1996), sections 1130.5, 1158.6, 1160.2, 1136.8. http://www.ucc.ie/celt/online/G100002/text009.html