ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 1652 http://www.s-gabriel.org/1652 ************************************ 15 May 1999 From: (Josh Mittleman) Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You asked whether is an appropriate name for an Irishman living before 700. You said you want a pre-English and possibly pre-Christian name. Here is what we have found. Christianity reached Ireland in the 5th century and became a significant force in the 6th. The Anglo-Normans settled Ireland in the late 12th and 13th centuries. That is a very broad range of time, during which the language of Ireland changed enormously. That change is reflected in the names that were used: A 5th century Primitive Irish name looks very little like a 9th century Old Irish name. Choosing a name for any time before the 7th century is very difficult because little evidence exists of names of that period, and what does exist is written in an archaic form of the language. If you want a Primitive Irish name, we will try to help you choose one; but we must warn you that the choice will be limited and the result will probably look nothing like what you think of as an Irish name [1]. If you'd like to pursue this option, write us again. For now, we're going to assume you want an Old Irish name appropriate for the 7th century or perhaps a little later. appears to be a typo for , which is a Scottish Gaelic name that is often anglicized as . The origin of this name is uncertain, but this spelling certainly did not exist in the early Middle Ages and the name was not used in medieval Ireland [2]. It may be related to one of two Old Irish masculine names, which have similar pronunciations: and [3, 4]. The slash in the names represents an accent on the preceding letter. The first name is pronounced \KAH-l~in-y@\, where \l~\ represents the sound of the in the Spanish or French and \@\ represents the vowel sound at the end of . The second name is \KYE-lin\, with the first syllable rhyming with . is a modern English spelling of some Irish family name. We could not find this spelling in our references, so we can't say for certain what name is represents. We found several possibilities which we'll describe in detail if you are interested, but none of them is appropriate for your period: Irish family names like this one did not come into use until the 10th century, much later than your period [6]. In your period, a man was most often known simply as his father's son. For example, Caille/ne son of Cormacc would have been called . , with the extra , is the possessive or 'genitive' form of , which means "Cormacc's" or "of Cormacc". If you'd like to choose a name for your father so that you can construct a patronymic byname like this one, you can find an excellent list on the web: 100 Most Popular Men's Names in Early Medieval Ireland http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/tangwystyl/irish100/ A man of your period might also have been known by a descriptive nickname. We found a couple that sound similar to and so might interest you [5, 6, 7]: Gaileonach "a man from Leinster" \GAH-l~@-n@kh\ Gala/nach "noisy" \GAH-lah-n@kh\ Gula/nach "given to weeping" \GOO-lah-n@kh\ \kh\ is the raspy sound in the Scottish word or German , and the \GOO\ in the last name is pronounced as in . would be a fine early-medieval Irish name. In formal circumstances, though, you would have added or substituted a patronymic for the nickname. We hope this letter has been useful. Please write 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 Talan Gwynek and Barak Raz. For the Academy, Arval Benicoeur 15 May 1999 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - References [1] The earliest surviving written written form of Irish dates from around the 4th century and is written on stone in the alphabet called "Ogham". When this writing tradition developed, the Irish language was very different from the medieval form -- about as different as Latin is from French. This stage of the language is variously called "Primitive Irish", "Ogam Irish", or "Oghamic Irish". This writing system continued in active use into the 7th century, and while it was in active use, its users tended to write a conservative form of the language corresponding to what was spoken when the system was developed. The spoken language, however, was undergoing considerable change. When a new writing system using Roman letters was developed in the 6th century, its users broke with tradition and wrote a language much closer to what was actually being spoken. This stage of the language, as recorded from the late 7th century to the mid-10th century the language, is called Old Irish. The problem with reconstructing names used before the Old Irish period is that the only forms that we know were written down are the Oghamic forms in the Primitive Irish language, and yet we also know that by the 6th century this written Primitive Irish must have been quite different from the way the language was actually spoken. It takes a good deal of specialized knowledge to put the pieces together and come up with a likely reconstruction of both the written name and its pronunciation. [2] is a Scottish Gaelic name, not found in Ireland. It might have originated as a dialect variant of the early medieval , later spelled . This name is anglicized as [3, 8, 9]. [3] O/ Corra/in, Donnchadh and Fidelma Maguire, _Irish Names_ (Dublin: The Lilliput Press, 1990). [4] O'Brien, M. A., ed., _Corpus Genealogiarum Hiberniae_ (Dublin: The Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1976). [5] MacLysaght, Edward, _The Surnames of Ireland_ (Dublin: Irish Academic Press Ltd., 1985, ISBN 0-7165-2366-3), s.n. (O) Gallina(gh). [6] Royal Irish Academy, _Dictionary of the Irish Language: based mainly on Old and Middle Irish materials_ (Dublin : Royal Irish Academy, 1983), s.n. gaileonach. [7] Dinneen, Patrick S. _Foclo/ir Gaedhilge agus Be/arla_ (Dublin: Irish Texts Society, 1979 [1927]), s.nn. gola/nach, gula/nach. [8] Black, George F., _The Surnames of Scotland: Their Origin, Meaning and History_, (New York: The New York Public Library, 1986), s.n. Colin, Culen. [9] Macbain, Alexander, _Etymological Dictionary of Scottish-Gaelic_, 2nd ed. (Orig. publ 1907(?); reprint New York: Hippocrene, 1998).