PART III.
CHAPTER I.
NAMES PROM THE GREEK.
Passing from Persian to Greek names, we feel at once that we are nearer home, and that we claim a nearer kindred in thoughts and habits, if not in blood, with the sons of Javan, than with the fire-worshippers. The national names are thus almost always explicable by the language itself, with a few exceptions, either when the name was an importation from Egypt or Phœnicia, whence many of the earlier arts had been brought.
Each Greek had but one name, which was given to him by his father either on or before the tenth day of his life, when a sacrifice and banquet was held. Genealogies were exceedingly interesting to the Greeks, as the mutual connection of city with city, race with race, was thus kept up, and community of ancestry was regarded as a bond of alliance, attaching the Athenians, for instance, to the Asiatic Ionians as both sons of Ion, or the Spartans to the Syracusans, as likewise descended from Doros. Each individual state had its deified ancestor, and each family of note a hero parent, to whom worship was offered at every feast, and who was supposed still to exert active protection over his votaries. The political rights of the citizens, and the place they occupied in the army, depended on their power of tracing their line from the forefather of a recognized tribe, after whose name the whole were termed with the patronymic termination ides (the son of). This was only, however, a distinction, for surnames were unknown, and each man possessed merely the individual personal appellation by which he was always called, without any title, be his station what it might. Families used, however, to mark themselves by recurring constantly to the same name. It was the correct thing to give the eldest son that of his paternal grandfather, as Kimon, Miltiades, then Kimon again, if the old man were dead, for if he were living it would have been putting another in his place, a bad omen, and therefore a father’s name was hardly ever given to a son. Sometimes, however, the prefix was preserved, and the termination varied, so as to mark the family without destroying the individual identity. Thus, Leonidas, the third son of Anaxandridas, repeated with an augmentative his grandfather’s name of Leo (a lion), as his father, Anaxandridas, did that of his own great grandfather, Anaxandras (king of man), whose son Eurycratidas was named from his grandfather Eurycrates. A like custom prevailed among the old English.
After the Romans had subdued Greece and extended the powers of becoming citizens, the name of the adopting patron would be taken by his client, and thus Latin and Greek titles became mixed together. Later, Greek second names became coined, either from patronymics, places, or events, and finally ran into the ordinary European system of surnames.
Among the names here ensuing will only be found those that concern the history of Christian names. Many a great heart-thrilling sound connected with the brightest lights of the ancient world must be passed by, because it has not pleased the capricious will of after-generations to perpetuate it, or so exceptionally as not to be worth mentioning.
Some of the female Greek names were appropriate words and epithets; but others, perhaps the greater number, were merely men’s names with the feminine termination in a or e, often irrespective of their meaning. Some of these have entirely perished from the lips of men, others have been revived by some enterprising writer in search of a fresh title for a heroine. Such is Corinna (probably from Persephone’s title Κόρη (Koré), a maiden)[maiden)], the Bœotian poetess, who won a wreath of victory at Thebes, and was therefore the example from whom Mdme. de Staël named her brilliant Corinne, followed in her turn by numerous French damsels; and in an Italian chronicle of the early middle ages, the lady whom we have been used to call Rowena, daughter of Henghist, has turned into Corinna; whilst Cora, probably through Lord Byron’s poem, is a favourite in America. Such too is Aspasia (welcome), from the literary fame of its first owner chosen by the taste of the seventeenth century as the title under which to praise the virtues of Lady Elizabeth Hastings. In the Rambler and Spectator days, real or fictitious characters were usually introduced under some classical or pastoral appellation, and ladies corresponded with each other under the soubriquets of nymph, goddess, or heroine, and in virtue of its sound Aspasia was adopted among these. It has even been heard as a Christian name in a cottage. “Her name’s Aspasia, but us calls her Spash.”[[24]]
[23]. Rawlinson, Herodotus; Malcolm, Persia; Le Beau, Bas Empire; Rollin, Ancient History; Butler, Lives of the Saints; Dunlop, History of Fiction.
[24]. Bishop Thirlwall, Greece; Smith, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities; Lappenberg, Anglo-Saxons.
CHAPTER II.
NAMES FROM GREEK MYTHOLOGY.
Section I.
Greek appellations may be divided into various classes; the first, those of the gods and early heroes are derived from languages inexplicable even by the classical Greeks. These were seldom or never given to human beings, though derivatives from them often were.
The second class is of those formed from epithets in the spoken language. These belonged to the Greeks of the historical age, and such as were borne by the Macedonian conquerors became spread throughout the East, thus sometimes falling to the lot of early saints of the Church, and becoming universally popular in Christendom. Of others of merely classic association a few survived among the native Greeks, while others were resuscitated at intervals; first, by the vanity of decaying Rome; next, by the revival of ancient literature in the Cinque-cento; then, by the magniloquent taste of the Scudery romances in France; again, in France, by the republican mania; and, in the present time, by the same taste in America, and by the reminiscences of the modern Greeks.
After the preaching of the Gospel, Greece had vigour enough to compose appropriate baptismal names for the converts; and it is curious to observe that no other country could have ever been so free from the trammels of hereditary nomenclature, for no other has so complete a set of names directly bearing upon Christianity. So graceful are they in sound as well as meaning, and so honoured for those who bore them, that many have spread throughout Europe.
Lastly, even modern Greek has thrown out many names of graceful sound, which are, however, chiefly confined to the Romaic.
Section II.—Names from Zeus.
At the head of the whole Greek system stands the mighty Zeus (Ζεύς), a word that has been erected into a proper name for the thundering father of gods and men, whilst the cognate θεὸς (theos) passed into a generic term; just as at Rome the Deus Pater (God-Father), or Jupiter, from the same source, became the single god, and deus the general designation.
All come from the same source as the Sanscrit Deva, and are connected with the open sky, and the idea of light that has produced our word day. We shall come upon them again and again; but for the present we will confine ourselves to the personal names produced by Zeus, in his individual character, leaving those from Theos to the Christian era, to which most of them belong.
Their regular declension of Zeus made Dios the genitive case; and thus Diodorus, Diogenes, &c., ought, perhaps, to be referred to him; but the more poetical, and, therefore, most probably the older, form, was Zenos in the genitive; and as Dios also meant heaven, the above names seem to be better explained as heaven-gift and heaven-born, leaving to Zeus only those that retain the same commencement.
Ζηνὼν, or, as it is commonly called, Zeno, was a good deal used in Greece throughout the classical times, and descending to Christian times, named a saint martyred under Gallienus, also a bishop of Verona, who left ninety-three sermons, at the beginning of the fourth century, and thus made it a canonical name, although the rules of the Church had forbidden christening children after heathen gods. Except for the Isaurian Emperor Zeno, and an occasional Russian Sinon, there has not, however, been much disposition to use the name.
Zenobios, life from Zeus, is by far the easiest way of explaining the name of the brilliant Queen of Palmyra; but, on the other hand, she was of Arabian birth, the daughter of Amrou, King of Arabia, and it is highly probable that she originally bore the true Arabic name of Zeenab (ornament of the father); and that when she and her husband entered on intercourse with the Romans, the name Zenobia was bestowed upon her as an equivalent, together with the genuine Latin Septima as a mark of citizenship. When her glory waned, and she was brought as a prisoner to Rome, she and her family were allowed to settle in Italy; and her daughters left descendants there. Zenobius, the Bishop of Milan, who succeeded St. Ambrose, bore her name, and claimed her blood; and thus Zenobio and Zenobia still linger among the inhabitants of the city.
The romance of her story caught the French fancy, and Zénobie has been rather in fashion among modern French damsels.
A Cilician brother and sister, called Zenobius and Zenobia, the former a physician and afterwards Bishop of Ægæ, were put to death together during the persecution of Diocletian, and thus became saints of the Eastern Church, making Sinovij, Sinovija, or for short, Zizi, very fashionable among the Russians.
It is much more difficult to account for the prevalence of Zenobia in Cornwall. Yet many parish registers show it as of an early date: and dear to the West is the story of a sturdy dame called Zenobia Brengwenna, (Mrs. Piozzi makes the surname Stevens,) who, on her ninety-ninth birthday, rode seventeen miles on a young colt to restore to the landlord a 99 years' lease that had been granted to her father, in her name, at her birth.
Probably Zenaïda means daughter of Zeus. Although not belonging to any patron saint, it is extensively popular among Russian ladies; and either from them, or from the modern Greek, the French have recently become fond of Zenaïde.[[25]]
[25]. Smith, Dictionary; Butler, Lives; Gibbon, Rome; Miss Beaufort, Egyptian Sepulchres and Syrian Shrines; Hayward, Mrs. Piozzi.
Section III.—Ἡρα—Hera.
The name of the white-armed, ox-eyed queen of heaven, Ἡρα or Ἡρη (Hera or Heré), is derived by philologists from the same root as the familiar German herr and herrinn, and thus signifies the lady or mistress. Indeed the masculine form ἥρως, whence we take our hero, originally meant a free or noble man, just as herr does in ancient German, and came gradually to mean a person distinguished on any account, principally in arms; and thence it became technically applied to the noble ancestors who occupied an intermediate place between the gods and existing men. The Latin herus and hera are cognate, and never rose out of their plain original sense of master and mistress, though the heros was imported in his grander sense from the Greek, and has passed on to us.
It is curious that whereas the wife of Zeus was simply the lady, it was exactly the same with Frigga, who, as we shall by-and-by see, was merely the Frau—the free woman or lady.
Hera herself does not seem to have had many persons directly named after her, though there was plenty from the root of her name. The feminine Hero was probably thus derived,—belonging first to one of the Danaïdes, then to a daughter of Priam, then to the maiden whose light led Leander to his perilous breasting of the Hellespont, and from whom Shakespeare probably took it for the lady apparently “done to death by slanderous tongues.”
It is usual to explain as Ἡρα-κλῆς (fame of Hera) the name of the son of Zeus and Alcmena, whose bitterest foe Hera was, according to the current legends of Greece; but noble fame is a far more probable origin for Herakles, compound as he is of the oft-repeated Sun-myth mixed with the veritable Samson, and the horrible Phœnician Melkarth or Moloch, with whom the Tyrians themselves identified Herakles.
A few compounds, such as Heraclius, Heraclidas, Heracleonas, have been formed from Herakles, the hero ancestor of the Spartan kings, and therefore specially venerated in Lacedæmon. The Latins called the name Hercules; and it was revived in the Cinque-cento, in Italy, as Ercole. Thus Hercule was originally the baptismal name of Catherine de Medici’s youngest son; but he changed it to François at his confirmation, when hoping to mount a throne. Exceptionally, Hercules occurs in England; and we have known of more than one old villager called Arkles, respecting whom there was always a doubt whether he were Hercules or Archelaus.
Hence, too, the name of the father of history, Herodotus (noble gift); hence, likewise, that of Herodes. Some derive this last from the Arab hareth (a farmer); but it certainly was a Greek name long before the Idumean family raised themselves to the throne of Judea, since a poet was so called who lived about the time of Cyrus. If the Herods were real Edomites, they may have Græcized Hareth into Herodes; but it is further alleged that the first Herod, grandfather of the first king, was a slave, attached to the temple of Apollo at Ascalon, taken captive by Idumean robbers. Hateful as is the name in its associations, its feminine, Herodias, became doubly hateful as the murderess of John the Baptist.
Section IV.—Athene.
The noble goddess of wisdom, pure and thoughtful, armed against evil, and ever the protector of all that was thoughtfully brave and resolute, was called Αθήνη (Athene), too anciently for the etymology to be discernible, or even whether her city of Athens was called from her, or she from the city.
Many an ancient Greek was called in honour of her, but the only one of these names that has to any degree survived is Athenaïs.
There were some Cappadocian queens, so called; and so likewise was the daughter of a heathen philosopher in the fourth century, whom the able Princess Pulcheria selected as the wife of her brother Theodosius, altering her name, however, to Eudocia at her baptism.
It must have been the Scudery cycle of romance that occasioned Athenaïs to have been given to that Demoiselle de Mortémar, who was afterwards better known as Madame de Montespan.
Athenaios (Athenian), Athenagoras (assembly of Athene), Athenadgoros (gift of Athene), were all common among the Greeks.
Athene’s surname of Pallas is derived by Plato from πάλλειν, to brandish, because of her brandished spear; but it is more likely to be from πάλλαξ (a virgin), which would answer to her other surname of παρθένος, likewise a virgin, familiar to us for the sake of the most beautiful of all heathen remains, the Parthenon, as well as the ancient name of Naples, Parthenope. This, however, was a female name in Greece, and numerous instances of persons called Parthenios and Palladios attest the general devotion to this goddess, perhaps the grandest of all the imaginings of the Indo-European.
There is something absolutely satisfactory in seeing how much more the loftier and purer deities, Athene, Apollo, Artemis, reigned over Greek nomenclature than the embodiments of brute force and sensual pleasure, Ares and Aphrodite, both probably introductions from the passionate Asiatics, and as we see in Homer, entirely on the Trojan side. An occasional Aretas and Arete are the chief recorded namesakes of Ares, presiding god of the Areopagus as he was; and thence may have come the Italian Aretino, and an Areta, who appears in Cornwall. Aphrodite seems to have hardly one derived from her name, which is explained as the Foam Sprung.[[26]]
[26]. Smith, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Mythology; Le Beau, Bas Empire; Gladstone, Homer.
Section V.—Apollo and Artemis.
The brother and sister deities, twin children of Zeus and Leto, are, with the exception of Athene, the purest and brightest creations of Greek mythology.
The sister’s name, Artemis, certainly meant the sound, whole, or vigorous; that of the brother, Apollōn, is not so certainly explained; though Æschylus considered it to come from ἀπόλλυμι, to destroy.
They both of them had many votaries in Greece; such names as Apollodorus (gift of Apollo), Apollonius, and the like, arising in plenty, but none of them have continued into Christian times, though Apollos was a companion of St. Paul. The sole exception is Apollonia, an Alexandrian maiden, whose martyrdom began by the extraction of all her teeth, thus establishing St. Apolline, as the French call her, as the favourite subject of invocation in the toothache. Abellona, the Danish form of this name, is a great favourite in Jutland and the isles, probably from some relic of the toothless maiden. The Slovaks use it as Polonija or Polona.
The votaries of Artemis did not leave a saint to perpetuate them; but Artemisia, the brave queen of Halicarnassus, had a name of sufficient stateliness to delight the précieuses. Thus Artémise was almost as useful in French romances as the still more magnificent[magnificent] Artémidore, the French version of Artemidorus (gift of Artemis).
It was a late fancy of mythology, when all was becoming confused, that made Apollo and Artemis into the sun and moon deities, partly in consequence of their epithets Phœbus, Phœbe, from φάω (to shine). The original Phœbe seems to have belonged to some elder myth, for she is said to have been daughter of Heaven and Earth, and to have been the original owner of the Delphic oracle. Afterwards she was said to have been the mother of Leto (the obscure), and thus grandmother of Apollo and Artemis, who thence took their epithet. This was probably a myth of the alternation of light and darkness; but as we have received our notions of Greek mythology through the dull Roman medium, it is almost impossible to disentangle our idea of Phœbus from the sun, or of Phœbe from the crescent moon. In like manner the exclusively modern Greek φωτεινή (bright), Photinee, comes from φώς phos (light), as does Photius, used in Russia as Fotie.
Strangely enough, we find Phœbus among the mediæval Counts of Foix, who, on the French side of their little Pyrenean county were Gaston Phœbus; on the Spanish, Gastone Febo. Some say that Phœbus was originally a soubriquet applied to one of the family on account of his personal beauty, though it certainly was afterwards given at baptism; others, that it was an imitation of an old Basque name.
Phœbe was a good deal in use among the women of Greek birth in the early Roman empire; and “Phœbe, our sister,” the deaconess[deaconess] of Cenchrea, is commended by St. Paul to the Romans; but she has had few namesakes, except in England; the Italian Febe only being used as a synonym for the moon.
Cynthia was a title belonging to Artemis, from Mount Cynthus, and has thence become a title of the moon, and a name of girls in America.
Delia, another title coming from Delos, the place of her nativity, has been preferred by the Arcadian taste, and flourished in shepherdess poems, so as to be occasionally used as a name in England, but more often as a contraction for Cordelia.
Delphinios and Delphinia were both of them epithets of Apollo and Artemis, of course from the shrine at Delphi. Some say that shrine and god were so called because the serpent Python was named Delphinè; others, that the epithet was derived from his having metamorphosed himself into a dolphin, or else ridden upon one, when showing the Cretan colonists the way to Delphi.
The meaning of Delphys adelphus is the womb; and thus the Greeks believed Delphi to be the centre of the earth, just as the mediæval Christians thought Jerusalem was. It is from this word that delphis (a brother) is derived, and from one no doubt of the same root, that was first a mass, and afterwards a dolphin, the similarity of sound accounting for the confusion of derivatives from the temple and the fish. Again, the dolphin is said to be so called as being the fish of the Dolphièm god.
It was probably as an attribute of the god that Delphinos was used as a name by the Greeks; and it makes its first appearance in Christian times in two regions under Greek influence, namely, Venice and Southern France, which latter place was much beholden for civilization to the Greek colony of Massilia. Dolfino has always prevailed in the Republic of St. Mark; and Delphinus was a sainted bishop of Bourdeaux, in the fourth century, from whom many, both male and female, took the name, which to them was connected with the fish of Jonah, the emblem of the Resurrection.
In 1125, Delfine, heiress of Albon, married Guiges, Count of Viennois. She was his third wife; and to distinguish her son from the rest of the family, he was either called or christened, Guiges Delphin, and assumed the dolphin as his badge, whence badge and title passed to his descendants, the Counts Dauphins de Viennois. The last of these left his country and title to Charles, son of King Jean of France; and thence the heir-apparent was called the Dauphin.
Dalphin appears at Cambrai before 1200; and Delphine de Glandèves, sharing the saintly honours of her husband, Count Elzéar de St. Sabran, became the patroness of the many young ladies in compliment to la dauphine.
It is startling to meet with ‘Dolphin’ as a daughter of the unfortunate Waltheof, Earl of Mercia; but unless her mother, Judith, imported the French Delphine, it is probable that it is a mistake for one of the many forms of the Frank, Adel, which was displacing its congener the native Æthel. Indeed, Dolfine, which is very common among German girls now, is avowedly the contraction of Adolfine, their feminine for Adolf (noble wolf).
Section VI.—Hele.
The sun-god who drove his flaming chariot around the heavenly vault day by day, and whose eye beheld everything throughout the earth, was in Homer’s time an entirely different personage from the “far darting Apollo,” with whom, thanks to the Romans, we confound him.
Helios was his name, a word from the root elé (light), the same that has furnished the Teutonic adjective hell (bright or clear), and that is met again in the Keltic heol (the sun).
This root ele (heat or light) is found again in the Greek name of the moon, Sēēlēnē once a separate goddess from Artemis. One of the Cleopatras was called Selene; but it does not appear that this was used again as a name till in the last century, when Selina was adopted in England, probably by mistake, for the French Céline, and belonged to the Wesleyan Countess of Huntingdon.
From ēlē again sprang the name most of all noted among Greeks, the fatal name of Ἑλένε, Helene, the feminine of Helenos (the light or bright), though Æschylus, playing on the word, made it ἑλένας (the ship-destroying).
“Wherefore else this fatal name,
That Helen and destruction are the same.”
A woman may be a proverb for any amount of evil or misfortune, but as long as she is also a proverb for beauty, her name will be copied, and Helena never died away in Greece, and latterly was copied by Roman ladies when they first became capable of a little variety.
At last it was borne by the lady who was the wife of Constantius Chlorus, the mother of Constantine, and the restorer of the shrines at Jerusalem. St. Helena, holding the true cross, was thenceforth revered by East and West. Bithynia on the one hand, Britain on the other, laid claim to have been her birth-place, and though it is unfortunately most likely that the former country is right, and that she can hardly be the daughter of “Old King Cole,” yet it is certain that the ancient Britons held her in high honour. Eglwys Ilan, the Church of Helen, still exists in Wales, and the insular Kelts have always made great use of her name. Ellin recurs in old Welsh pedigrees from the Empress’s time. Elayne is really the old Cambrian form occurring in registers from early times, and thus explaining the gentle lady Elayne, the mother of Sir Galahad, whom Tennyson has lately identified with his own spinning Lady of Shalott. Helen, unfortunately generally pronounced Ellen, was used from the first in Scotland; Eileen or Aileen in Ireland.
Nor are these Keltic Ellens the only offspring of the name. Elena in Italy, it assumed the form of Aliénor among the Romanesque populations of Provence, who, though speaking a Latin tongue, greatly altered and disguised the words. Indeed there are some who derive this name from έλεος (pity), but there is much greater reason to suppose it another variety of Helena, not more changed than many other Provençal names. Aliénor in the land of troubadours received all the homage that the Languedoc could pay, and one Aliénor at least was entirely spoilt by it, namely, she who was called Eléonore by the French king who had the misfortune to marry her, and who became in time on English lips our grim Eleanor of the dagger and the bowl, the hateful Aquitainian[Aquitainian] grandmother, who bandies words with Constance of Brittany in King John. Her daughter, a person of far different nature, carried her name to Castille, where, the language being always disposed to cut off a commencing e, she was known as Leonor, and left hosts of namesakes. Her descendant, the daughter of San Fernando, brought the name back to England, and, as our “good Queen Eleanor,” did much to redeem its honour, which the levity of her mother-in-law, the Provençal Aliénor of Henry III., had greatly prejudiced. Eleanor continued to be a royal name as long as the Plantagenets were on the throne, and thus was widely used among the nobility, and afterwards by all ranks, when of course it lost its proper spelling and was turned into Ellinor and Elinor, still, however, owning its place in song and story. Annora, frequent in Northern England, was the contraction of Eleanora, and was further contracted into Annot. Also Ellen was Lina, or Linot.
| Greek. | Latin. | English. | Scotch. |
| Ἑλένη | Helena | Helena | Helen |
| Helen | Ellen | ||
| Elaine | |||
| Ellen | |||
| Ἑλένἰσκη | Eleanor | ||
| Elinor | |||
| Nelly | |||
| Ἑλεναιαι | Leonora | ||
| Annora | |||
| Annot | |||
| Lina | |||
| Linot | |||
| Irish. | German. | Italian. | Spanish. |
| Helena | Helène | Elena | Helena |
| Eileen | Eleonore | Eleonora | |
| Nelly | Lenore | Leonora | Leon |
| Russian. | Polish. | Slavonic. | Servian. |
| Jelena | Helena | Jelena | Jelena |
| Helenka | Jela | Jela | |
| Jelena | Jelika | ||
| Jela | |||
| Jelika | |||
| Lenka | |||
| Lencica | |||
| Lett. | Esthonian. | Ung. | Albanian. |
| Lena | Leno | Ilona | |
| Ljena | |||
| Lenia |
Meantime the Arragonese conquests in Italy had brought Leonora thither as a new name independent of Elena, and it took strong root there, still preserving its poetic fame in the person of the lovely Leonora d'Este, the object of Tasso’s hopeless affection. To France again it came with the Galigai, the Maréchale d'Ancre, the author of the famous saying about the power of a strong mind over a weak one; and unpopular as she was, Léonore has ever since been recognized in French nomenclature, and it went to Germany as Lenore.
The Greek Church was constant to the memory of the Empress, mother of the founder of Constantinople, and Helena has always been frequent there. And when the royal widow Olga came from Muscovy to seek instruction and baptism, she was called Helena, which has thus become one of the popular Russian names. It is sometimes supposed to be a translation of Olga, but this is a mistake founded on the fact that this lady, and another royal saint, were called by both names. Olga is, in fact, the feminine of Oleg (the Russian form of Helgi), which the race of Rurik had derived from their Norse ancestor, and it thus means holy.
Sweden also has a Saint Helene, who made a pilgrimage to Rome, and was put to death on her return by her cruel relations in 1160. Her relics were preserved in Zealand, near Copenhagen, making Ellin a favourite name among Danish damsels.
Helena has a perplexing double pronunciation in English, the central syllable being made long or short according to the tradition of the families where it is used. The Greek letter was certainly the short e, but it is believed that though the quantity of the syllable was short, the accent was upon it, and that the traditional sound of it survives in the name of the island which we learnt from the Portuguese.
Section VII.—Demeter.
Among the elder deities in whom the primitive notion of homage to the Giver of all Good was lost and dispersed, was the beneficent mother Demeter (Δημητήρ). Some derive the first syllable of this name from γῆ (the earth), others from the Cretan δήαι (barley), making it either earth mother, or barley mother; but the idea of motherhood is always an essential part of this bounteous goddess, the materializing of the productive power of the earth, “filling our hearts with food and gladness.”
Formerly Demeter had numerous votaries, especially among the Macedonians, who were the greatest name-spreaders among the Greeks, and used it in all the “four horns” of their divided empire. It occurs in the Acts, as the silversmith of Ephesus, who stirred up the tumult against St. Paul, and another Demetrius is commended by St. John. The Latin Church has no saint so called; but the Greek had a Cretan monk of the fourteenth century, who was a great ecclesiastical author; and a Demetrios, who is reckoned as the second great saint of Thessalonika. Hence Demetrios is one of the most popular of names in all the Eastern Church, and the countries that have ever been influenced by it; among whom must be reckoned the Venetian dominions which considered themselves to belong to the old Byzantine empire till they were able to stand alone. Dimitri has always been a great name in Russia. The Slavonian nations give it the contraction Mitar, and the feminine Dimitra or Mitra. The modern Greek contraction is Demos.
In some parts of Greece, Demeter was worshipped primarily as the gloomy winterly earth, latterly as the humanized goddess clad in black, in mourning for her daughter, whence she was adored as Melaina. Whether from this title of the goddess or simply a dark complexion, there arose the female name of Melania, which belonged to two Roman ladies, grandmother and granddaughter, who were among the many who were devoted to the monastic Saint Jerome, and derived an odour of sanctity from his record of their piety. Though not placed in the Roman calendar, they are considered as saints, and the French Mélanie and the old Cornish Melony are derived from them.
On the contrary, her summer epithet was Chloe, the verdant, as protectress of green fields, and Chloe seems to have been used by the Greeks, as a Corinthian woman so called is mentioned by St. Paul, and has furnished a few scriptural Chloes in England. In general, however, Chloe has been a property of pastoral poetry, and has thence descended to negroes and spaniels.[[27]]
[27]. Smith, Dictionary; Keightley’s Mythology; Montalembert, Monks of the West; Michaelis.
Section VIII.—Dionysos.
The god of wine and revelry appears to have been adopted into Greek worship at a later period than the higher divinities embodying loftier ideas. So wild and discordant are the legends respecting him, that it is probable that in the Bacchus, or Dionysos, whom the historical Greeks adored, several myths are united; the leading ones being, on the one hand, the naturalistic deity of the vine; on the other, some dimly remembered conqueror.
Dionysos has never been satisfactorily explained, though the most obvious conclusion is that it means the god of Nysa—a mountain where he was nursed by nymphs in a cave. Others make his mother Dione one of the original mythic ideas of a divine creature, the daughter of Heaven and Earth, and afterwards supposed to be the mother of Aphrodite.
Names given in honour of Dionysos were very common in Greece, and especially in the colony of Sicily, where Dion was also in use. Dionysios, the tyrant, seemed only to make the name more universally known, and most of the tales of tyranny clustered round him—such as the story of his ear, of the sword of Damocles, and the devotion of Damon and Pythias.
In the time of the Apostles, Dionysius was very frequent, and gave the name of the Areopagite mentioned by St. Paul, of several more early saints, and of a bishop who, in 272, was sent to convert the Gauls, and was martyred near Paris. The Abbey erected on the spot where he died was placed under the special protection of the Counts of Paris; and when they dethroned the sons of Charlemagne and became kings of France, St. Denys, as they called their saint, became the patron of the country; the banner of the convent, the Oriflamme, was unfurled in their national wars, and Mont joie St. Denys was their war-cry. St. Denys of France was invoked, together with St. Michael, in knighting their young men; and St. Denys of France was received as one of the Seven Champions of Christendom.
The Sicilians, having a certain confusion in their minds between the champion and the tyrant of Syracuse, have taken San Dionigi for their patron; he is also in high favour in Portugal as Diniz, and in Spain as Dionis. Denis is a very frequent Irish name, as a substitute for Donogh; and, to judge by the number of the surnames, Dennis, Denison, and Tennyson or Tenison, it would seem to have been more common in England than at present. The Russians have Dionissij; the Bohemians, Diwis; the Slavonians, Tennis; the Hungarians, Dienes. The feminine is the French Denise; English, Dionisia, Donnet, Dennet or Diot, which seem to have been at one time very common in England.[[28]]
[28]. Liddell and Scott, Keightley, Michaelis, Smith.
Section IX.—Hermes.
The origin is lost of the name of Hermes, the swift, eloquent, and cunning messenger of Zeus; but it is supposed to come from hĕra (the earth), and was called Hermas, Hermes, or Hermeias.
A long catalogue of Greeks might be given bearing names derived from him; and it was correctly that Shakespeare called his Athenian maiden Hermia.
Hermas is mentioned in the Epistle to the Romans, and is thought to be the same with the very early Christian author of the allegory of The Shepherd, but his name has not been followed.
Hermione was, in ancient legend, the wife of Cadmus, the founder of Thebes, and shared his metamorphosis into a serpent. Afterwards, another Hermione was the daughter of Helen and Menelaus, and, at first, wife of Neoptolemus, though afterwards of Orestes, the heroine of a tragedy of Euripides, where she appears in the unpleasant light of the jealous persecutor of the enslaved Andromache.
Hermione is generally supposed to be the same as the Italian Erminia and the French Hermine; but these are both remains of the Herminian gens, and are therefore Latin.
Hermocrates, Hermagoras, Hermogenes, every compound of this god’s name prevailed in Greece; but the only one that has passed on to Christianity is Hermolaos (people of Hermes), a name that gave a saint to the Greek Church, and is perpetuated in Russia as Ermolaï.[[29]]
Descending from the greater deities of Olympus, we must touch upon the Muses, though not many instances occur of the use of their names. Μοῦσαι (Mousai), their collective title, is supposed to come from μάω (mao), to invent; it furnished the term mousikos, for songs and poetry, whence the Latin musa, musicus, and all the forms in modern language in which we speak of music and its professors.
Musidora (gift of the Muses) was one of the fashionable poetical soubriquets of the last century, and as such figures in Thomson’s Seasons.
As to the individual names, they have scarcely any owners except Polymnia, she of many hymns, whose modern representative, Polyhymnia, lies buried in a churchyard on Dartmoor, and startles us by her headstone. The West Indian negresses, sporting the titles of the ships of war, however, come out occasionally as Miss Calliope, Miss Euterpe, &c.
The only Muse who has left namesakes is hardly a fair specimen; for Urania (the heavenly), her epithet, as the presiding genius of astronomers, is itself formed from one of the pristine divinities of Greece, himself probably named from heaven itself, of which he was the personification. Οὐρανός (Ouranos), Uranus, is in Greek both the sky and the first father of all. The word is probably derived from the root or, which we find in ὄρος (a mountain), and ὄρνυμι[ὄρνυμι] (to raise), just as our heaven comes from to heave.
Uranius was not uncommon among the later Greeks, especially in Christian names; a Gaulish author was so called, and it was left by the Romans as a legacy to the British. It makes its appearance among the Welsh as Urien, a somewhat common name at one time. “Brave Urien sleeps upon his craggy bed;” but Camden, or some one else before him, thought proper to identify it with George, which has led to its decay and oblivion.
Urania was revived in the days of euphuistic taste, when Sir Philip Sidney called himself Sidrophel, and the object of his admiration, Urania; it became a favourite poetic title both in England and France, and in process of time, a family name.
Θάλεια (Thaleia), though both Muse of Comedy, and one of the Three Graces, and signifying bloom, has not obtained any namesakes, though both her sister Graces have.
These nymphs were the multiplied personifications of Χάρις (Charis) grace, beauty, or charity. The Greeks were not unanimous as to the names or numbers of the Charites; the Athenians and Spartans adored only two, and the three usually recognized were defined by Hesiod. Thalia (bloom), Aglaia (brightness), Euphrosyne (mirth, cheerfulness, or festivity).
It has been almost exclusively by Greeks that the name has been borne; it was a great favourite among the Romaic Greeks, figuring again and again amongst the Porphyrogenitai, and to this present day it is common among the damsels of the Ionian Isles. I have seen it marked on a school-child’s sampler in its own Greek letters. In common life it is called Phroso. In Russia it is Jefronissa.
The other Grace, Aglaia, comes to light in Christian legend, as the name of a rich and abandoned lady at Rome, who, hearing of the value that was set on the relics of saints, fancied them as a kind of roc’s egg to complete the curiosities of her establishment, and sent Boniface, both her steward and her lover, to the East to procure some for her. He asked in jest whether, if his bones came home to her, she would accept them as relics; and she replied in the same spirit, little dreaming that at Tarsus he would indeed become a Christian and a martyr, and his bones be truly sent back to Rome, where Aglaia received them, became a penitent, took the veil, and earned the saintly honours that have ever since been paid to her. It is unfortunate for the credibility of this story that the date assigned to it is between 209 and 305, a wide space indeed, but one in which relic worship had not begun, and even if it had, the bones of martyrs must have been only too plentiful much nearer home. However, the French have taken up the name of Aglaë, and make great use of it.
A few ancient Greeks had names compounded of Charis, such as Charinus, and Charilaus, the nephew of Lycurgus; but it was reserved for Christianity to give the word its higher sense. Charis, through the Latin caritas, grew to be the Christian’s Charity, the highest of the three Graces: Faith, Hope, Love, that had taken the place of Bloom, Mirth, and Brightness. And thus it was that, after the Reformation, Charity, contracted into Cherry, became an English Christian name, perhaps in remembrance of the fair and goodly Charity of the House Beautiful, herself a reflex of the lovely and motherly Charissa, to whom Una conducted the Red Cross Knight. Chariton, Kharitoon, in Russian, is a name in the Greek Church, from a confessor of Sirmium, who under Aurelius was flogged with ox-hides and imprisoned, but was liberated on the Emperor’s death, and made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
Perhaps this is the place, among these minor mythological personages, to mention that Zephyr (the West wind) has absolutely a whole family of name-children in France, where Zephirine has been greatly the fashion of late years.[[30]]
[29]. Keightley’s Mythology; Cave’s Lives of the Fathers; Smith, Dictionary; Potter’s Euripides.
[30]. Smith, Dictionary; Keightley, Mythology; Montalembert.
Section X.—Heroic Names.
Not very many of the heroic names—glorious in poetry—have passed on; but we will select a few of those connected with the siege of Troy, and handed on upon that account. Mostly they were not easy of comprehension even to the Greeks themselves, and were not much copied among them, perhaps from a sense of reverence. It was only in the times of decay, and when the recollection of the fitness of things was lost, that men tried to cover their own littleness with the high-sounding names of their ancestors. Moreover, by that time, Greek associations were at a discount. Rome professed to descend from Troy, not from Greece; and, after her example, modern nations have tried to trace themselves back to the Trojan fugitives—the Britons to Brut, the French to Francus, &c.—and thus Trojan names have been more in vogue than Greek. However, be it observed that the Trojan names are Greek in origin. The Trojans were of Pelasgic blood, as well as most of their opponents; but they were enervated by residence in Asia, while the superior race of Hellenes had renovated their Greek relatives; making just the difference that the Norman Conquest did to the English Saxon in opposition to his Frisian brother.
One of these inexplicable names was borne by Ἀχιλλεύς (Achilleus), the prime glory of Homer and of the Trojan war. The late Greek traditions said that his first name had been Ligyron, or the whining, but that he was afterwards called Achilles, from Α privative and χέιλη (cheile), lip; because he was fed in his infancy on nothing but lions' hearts and bears' marrow. This legend, however, looks much as if the true meaning of the word had been forgotten, and this was a forgery to account for it. However this may be, modern Greece and France alone repeat the name, and it is much disguised by the French pronunciation of Achille. A martyr in Dauphiné was called Achilles; and an Achilla appears, as a lady, early in the Visconti pedigree.
Gallant Hector, who, perhaps, is the most endearing of all the Trojan heroes, from the perfection of his character in tenderness, devotion, and courage, and the beautiful poetry of his parting with his wife and son, bore a name that is an attribute of Zeus, Ἕκτωρ (holding fast), i. e., defending, from Ἕχω (hecho), to have or to hold—a word well-befitting the resolute mainstay of a falling cause.
Italy, where the descent from the Trojans was early credited and not, perhaps, impossible, is the only country where his name has been genuinely imitated, under the form of Ettore. The Hector of Norway is but an imitation of the old Norse Hagtar (hawk of Thor), and the very frequent Hector of Scotland is the travestie of the Gaelic Eachan (a horseman). In like manner the Gaelic Aonghas (excellent valour) and the Welsh Einiawn (the just), are both translated into Æneas; indeed it is possible that the early Welsh Saint, Einiawn, may indeed have been an Æneas; for, in compliment to the supposed descent of the Julii from Æneas, this name is very common in the latter times of the empire: it appears in the book of Acts, and belonged to several writers. Latterly, in the beginning of the classical taste of Italy, the name of Enea Silvio was given to that Piccolomini who afterwards became a pope. This form is in honour of that son of Æneas and Lavinia who was said to have been born in a wood after his father’s death. A son of the Earl of Hereford was called Æneas (temp. Ed. III).
The pious Æneas owes his modern fame to Virgil. In the time of Homer, even his goddess-mother had not raised him into anything like the first rank of the heroes who fought before Troy. His name in the original is Αἰνείας (Aineias), and probably comes from αἰυέο (aineo), to praise.
The poem that no doubt suggested the Æneid, the Homeric story of the Greek wanderer, contains some of those elements that so wonderfully show the kindred of far distant nations. We are content to call this wonderful poem by something approaching to its Greek title, though we are pleased to term the hero by the Latin travestie of his name—Ulysses, the consequence, it is supposed, of some transcriber having mistaken between the letters Δ and Λ. The Romans, likewise, sometimes called him Ulixes; the Greek σσ and ξ being, by some, considered as the same letter. Οδυσσεύς (Odysseus), his true name, is traced to the root δυς (dys), hate, the Sanscrit dvish, and from the same source as the Latin odio. Italians talked of Uliseo, and Fenelon taught the French to honour his favourite hero as le fils du grand Ulisse; but the only place where the name is now used is Ireland, probably as a classicalism for the Danish legacy of Ulick—Hugleik, or mind reward. The Irish Finnghuala (white shoulders) was not content with the gentle native softenings of her name into Fenella and Nuala, but must needs translate herself into Penelope; and it is to this that we owe the numerous Penelopes of England, down from the Irish Penelope Devereux, with whom is connected the one shade on Sidney’s character, to the Pen and Penny so frequent in many families.
The faithful queen of Ithaca was probably named Πηνελόπη, or Πηνελόπεια, from her diligence over the loom, since πήνη (pēnē) is thread on the bobbin, πηνίζομαι is to wind it off; but a later legend declared that she had been exposed as an infant, and owed her life to being fed by a kind of duck called πηνέλοψ (penelops), after which she was therefore called. This has since been made the scientific name of the turkey, and translators of Christian names have generally set Penelope down as a turkey-hen, in oblivion that this bird, the D'Inde of France, the Wälsche Hahn of Germany, always in its name attesting its foreign origin, came from America 3000 years after the queen of Ithaca wove and unwove beneath her midnight lamp.
Her son Telemachus (distant battle) had one notable namesake in the devoted hermit who for ever ended the savage fights of the amphitheatre; but, though Télémaque was a triumph of genius and tender religious feeling in spite of bad pseudo-classical taste, has not been again repeated.
Cassandra appears in Essex in 1560, and named the sister of Jane Austen.
CHAPTER III.
NAMES FROM ANIMALS, ETC.
Section I.—The Lion.
Much of the spirit of the nation is to be traced in the animals whence their names are derived. The Jew, whose temper, except when thoroughly roused, was peaceful and gentle, had hardly any save the names of the milder and more useful creatures: the ewe, the lamb, the bee, the fawn, &c. The Indo-European races, on the other hand, have the more brave and spirited animals, many of them running through the entire family of nations thus derived, and very possibly connected with that ‘beast epic,’ as Mr. Dasent calls it, which crops out everywhere; in the East, in apologues and fables; and towards the West, in ‘mahrchen,’ according to the expressive German term. It is just as if in the infancy of the world, there was the same living sympathy with the animal creation that we see in a young child, and that the creatures had at one time appeared to man to have an individual character, rank, and history of their own, explained by myths, in which these beings are the actors and speakers, and assumed a meaning divine, symbolic, didactic, or simply grotesque, according to the subsequent development of the peoples by whom they were handed down.
The lion is one of these universal animals, testifying how long dim memories of the home in Asia must have clung to the distant wanderers.
Leon, or Leo, was early a favourite name among the Greeks; and Herodotus thinks, on account of its meaning, that the captive Leo was the first victim of the Persians. It passed on in unceasing succession through Greeks of all ranks till it came to Byzantine emperors and Roman bishops. Two popes, to whom Rome owed the deepest debt of gratitude—to the one, for interceding with Attila; to the other, for turning away the wrath of the Saracens—were both called Leo, and it thus became a favourite on the papal throne, and was considered to allude to the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, which was therefore sculptured on St. Peter’s, in the time of the Medicean Leo X.
Leone, and Léon, and Léonie have continued in use in France and Italy. The word has been much compounded from the earlier Greek times, Leontius, Leontia, whence the modern French Léonce. The name Leonidas, the glorious self-devoted Spartan, after entire desuetude, has been revived in Greece and America.
The Romanized Britons adopted the Lion name, which amongst them became Llew, the Lot of the romances of the Round Table. Here likewise figured the gallant Sir Lionel, from whom Edward III., in chivalrous mood, named his third son, the ancestor of the House of York. An unfortunate young Dane, to whom the Dutch republic stood sponsor, received the name of Leo Belgicus. The Slavonic forms are Lev, Lav, and Lew, which, among the swarms of Jews in Poland, have become a good deal confounded with their hereditary Levi.
Leandros, Leander, as we call it, means lion-man. Besides the unfortunate swimming lover whose exploit Byron imitated and Turner painted, it belonged to a sainted bishop of Seville, who, in 590, effected the transition of the Spanish Visigoths from Arianism to orthodoxy. Very likely his name was only a classicalizing of one of the many Gothic names from leut (the people), which are often confused with those from the lion; but Leandro passed on as a Christian name in Spain and Italy.
The name Leocadia, a Spanish maiden martyred by the Moors, had probably some connection with a lion; but it cannot be traced in the corrupted state of the language. Léocadie has travelled into France.
The Slavonians have Lavoslav (lion-glory), which they make the equivalent of the Teutonic Liutpold or Leopold, really meaning the people’s prince.
Löwenhard (the stern lion, or lion strong), was a Frank noble, who was converted at the same time as his sovereign, Clovis, and became a hermit near Limoges. Many miracles were imputed to him, and St. Leonard became a peculiarly popular saint both in France and England. Leonard is a favourite name in France; and has some popularity in England, chiefly, it is said, in the north, and in the Isle of Wight. Lionardo is Italian, witness Lionardo da Vinci; and, according to Gil Blas, Leonarda is a Spanish feminine; Germany has in surnames Lenhardt, Lehnart, Leinhardt, Lowen; Italy invented the formidable Christian name, Brancalleone (Brachium leonis), or arm of a lion; and Bavaria has Lowenclo (lion-claw).
| English. | French. | German. | Swiss. | Italian. |
| Leonard | Léonard | Leonhard | Liert | Lionardo |
| Leunairs | Lienhard | Liertli | ||
| Launart | Lienl | Lienzel |
Section II.—The Horse.
The horse is as great a favourite as the lion, and is prominent in many a myth from the Caspian to the Frozen Ocean. His name in Sanscrit açva, in Zendish esp or asp, comes forth in the Greek ἵππος or ἵkkoς, showing its identity with the Latin equus, the Gaelic each, and it may be with the Teutonic hengst.
Among these various races it is the Persian, the Greek, and the Gael who have chiefly used the term for this noble animal in their nomenclature.
The Persian feminine Damaspia is said exactly to answer to the Greek Hippodameia, the female of Hippodamus (horse-tamer), and Hippos forms part of far too many Greek names to be here enumerated, except where they have become popular elsewhere.
One would have imagined that Hippos and λύω (to destroy) must have suggested the name of Hippolytus, the son of Theseus, who was destroyed by his own horse, terrified by a sea monster; but, on the other hand, he appears to have been named after his mother Hippolita, the beautiful queen of the Amazons, whom Shakespeare has shown us hunting in his wondrous Attic forest. However this may be, Hippolytus has many namesakes; among them an early Christian writer, and also a priest at Rome, who in the year 252 was condemned by the persecuting judge to die the death his name suggested. The Christians buried him in a catacomb, which bears his name. Sant’Ippolito became a parish church at Rome, and of course gave a title to one of the cardinals, and Ippolito and Ippolita have always been fashionable Italian names. He was also the patron of horsemen and horses, and the latter were solemnly blessed in his name. Xanthippe’s name is feminine of Xanthippus (a yellow horse!) What a pity it was not a grey one!
The Persian Aspamitras (horse-lover) exactly corresponds to the Greek Φίλιππoς (loving horses). Thus were named many obscure kings of Macedon, before that sagacious prince who prepared the future glories of his son by disciplining his army, and crushing Greece in spite of those indignant orations of Demosthenes, which have made Philippics the generic term for vehement individual censure.
Macedon, by colonizing the East, spread Philippos over it, and thus was named the apostle of Bethsaida, and likewise one of the deacons, chosen for his ‘Grecian’ connections.
The apostle was martyred at Hierapolis; nevertheless an arm of his, according to the Bollandists, was brought to Florence from Constantinople, in 1205, and made Filippo, Filippa, Lippo, Pippo, Pippa, great favourites in Northern Italy.
Greece and her dependent churches always used the name of Philip, or Feeleep, as they call it in Russia; and it was the eldest son of the Muscovite Anne, Queen of Henri I., who was the first Philippe to wear the crown of France. He transmitted his name to five more kings, and to princes innumerable, of whom one became Duke of Burgundy. His descendant, the half Flemish, half Austrian Philippe the handsome, married Juana la Loca of Castille and Aragon, and their grandson was known as Felipe II. in Spain. During his brief and ill-omened stay in England, he was godfather to Philip Sidney, whose name commemorated the gratitude of his mother to the King Consort for having interceded for the life of [his] father the Duke of Northumberland.
Philip, in both genders, was, however, already common in England. Queen Philippe, as she called herself, our admirable Hainaulter, was the god-daughter of Philippe de Valois, her husband’s rival; and many a young noble and maiden bore her honoured name, which one female descendant carried to Portugal, and another to Sweden, where both alike worthily sustained the honour of Plantagenet.
The name of Philippe is particularly common in the Isle of Jersey, so that it has become a joke with sailors to torment the inhabitants by calling them Philip as they would term an Irishman Paddy.
Filippo is additionally popular in Italy at present from the favourite modern Saint Filippo Neri.[[31]]
| English. | Scotch. | French. | German. | Italian. |
| Philip | Phillipp | Philippe | Philipp | Filippo |
| Phil | Philipot | Lipp | Pippo | |
| Phip | Lipperl | Lippo | ||
| Philipp | ||||
| Lipp | ||||
| Lipperl | ||||
| Portuguese. | Spanish. | Russian. | Lett. | Hungarian |
| Felippe | Felipe | Feeleep | Wilips | Fülip |
| Felipinho | Lipsts | |||
| Felipe | ||||
| FEMININE | ||||
| English. | French. | Portuguese. | Dutch. | Italian |
| Philippa | Philippine | Felipa | Pine | Filippa |
| Flipote | Pippa | |||
[31]. Rawlinson’s Herodotus; Keightley’s Mythology; Butler; Michaelis.
Section III.—The Goat.
The goat (αἴξ) stands out prominently in northern mythology, though there scarcely, if at all, used in nomenclature. In Greek mythology he appears, though not distinctly, and the names derived from him are manifold.
The goat was the standard of Macedon (the rough goat was the King of Grecia), as Daniel had announced while Greece was yet in her infancy, and Macedon in barbarism, not even owned as of the Hellenic confederacy. The unfortunate posthumous son of Alexander was therefore called Aigos, or Ægos, in addition to his father’s name.
The aigis, ægis, or shield of Pallas Athene, though said to bear the gorgon’s head, was probably at first a goat skin. From it is formed Aigidios, Ægidius. In 475, there was an Ægidius, a Roman commander in Gaul, who was for a time an independent sovereign, ruling over both Romans and Franks. About two centuries later, an Athenian, as it is said, by name Ægidius, having worked a miraculous cure by laying his cloak over the sick man, fled to France to avoid the veneration of the people, and dwelt on the banks of the Rhone, living on the milk of a hind. The creature was chased by the king of France, and, flying wounded to her master, discovered him to the hunters. Thenceforth he has been revered as St. Giles, and considered as the patron of numbers thus called. Now, is Giles a contraction of Ægidius, or is it the corruption of the Latin Julius; or, again, is it the Keltic Giolla, a servant, or the Teutonic Gils, a pledge? Every one of these sounds more like it than the Greek word, and it does seem probable that the Athenian, if Athenian he were, was seized upon as patron by aliens to his name, and then cut down to suit them. However, Ægidius continued to be treated as the Latin for Giles; Egidio became an Italian name; and as St. Giles was patron of Edinburgh, Egidia was used by Scottish ladies; one of the sisters of King Robert II. was so called, and even now it is not quite extinct.[[32]]
Section IV.—The Bee.
The word μείλα (soothing things) gave the verb μειλίσσω, or μελίσσω (melisso), to soothe or sweeten, whence the name of honey, and of the honey-bee. Melissa was sometimes said to have been the name of the nymph who first taught the use of honey, and bees, perhaps from their clustering round their queen, became the symbol of nymphs. Thence Melissa grew to be the title of a priestess as well as a lady’s name in classic times.
Melissa was invented by the Italian poets as the beneficent fairy who protected Bradamante, and directed Ruggero to escape from Atlante, and afterwards from Alcina, upon the hippogriff. Thus she entered the domain of romance, and became confounded with the Melusine and Melisende, who had risen out of the Teutonic Amalaswinth; and Melisse and Melite were adopted into French nomenclature.
Akin to Melissa is Γλυκηρά (Glykera), the sweet. This was not a feminine in good repute in ancient Athens, but it has since belonged to a saint of the Greek Churches, namely, the daughter of Macarius, thrice consul, who in the time of Antoninus suffered torments for a long time at Trajanopolis; and Gloukera is prevalent in Russia; and Glykera, or Glycère, in France.[[33]]
[32]. Keightley’s Fairy Mythology; Croker’s Fairy Legends; Tooke’s History of Russia; Butler.
[33]. Liddell and Scott; Professor Munch; Junius.
Section V.—Names from Flowers.
It was not common in Greece to name persons from flowers, but two names in occasional use are connected with legends of transformation, though in each case it is evident that the name belonged originally to the flower, and then was transferred to the man.
Thus the Narcissus, named undoubtedly from ναρκάω (narkao), to put to sleep, has become the object of a graceful legend of the cold-hearted youth, for whose sake the nymph Echo pined away into a mere voice, and in retribution was made to see his own beauty in the water and waste from hopeless love for his own image, until his corpse became the drooping golden blossom, that loves to hang above still pools of water, like the “dancing daffodils” of Wordsworth.
Narcissus seems to have been a name among the Greek slaves of the Romans, for we twice find it belonging to freedmen of the Emperor. St. Narcissus was Bishop of Jerusalem in 195, and presided at the council that fixed the great festival of the Resurrection on a Sunday instead of on the day fixed by the full moon like the Jews. The Russians call it Narkiss; the Romans, Narcisso; and it has even been found belonging to an English peasant.
Hyacinthus (Ὑάκινθος) was a beautiful Spartan youth, who, being accidentally killed by Apollo in a game with the discus, was caused by the sorrowing divinity to propagate from his blood a flower bearing on its petals either his initial Υ or the αί (alas), the cry of lamentation. A yearly feast was held at Sparta in honour of Hyacinthus, and his name was perpetuated till Christian times, when a martyr bore it at Rome, and thus brought it into favour in Italy as Giacinto; also a Polish Dominican Jacinthus in the thirteenth century, is commemorated as the Apostle of the North, because he preached Christianity in great part of Russia and Tartary; but curiously enough it is in Ireland alone that Hyacinth has ever flourished as a man’s name, probably as a supposed equivalent to some native Erse name. There it is very common among the peasantry, and is in common use as Sinty, while in France, Italy, and Spain, though apparently without a saintly example of their own sex, Jacinthe, Giacinta, and Jacinta are always feminine, and rather popular peasant names.
Ῥόδος (Rhodos), the rose, is a word connected in its source with the origin of the Teuton roth, Keltic ruadh, and Latin rufus. Roses are the same in almost every tongue, and they almost always suggest female names; of which the most interesting to us is Rhoda, “the household maid, of her own joy afraid,” who “opened not the gate for gladness” when she knew the voice of St. Peter as he stood without the door after his release from prison and death. Her name, as a Scripture one, has had some use in England, though, in general, the Roses of each country have grown upon their own national grafts from the one great stock, or, more strangely, are changed from horses.
Φύλλις (Phyllis), a green leaf or bough, has another story of transformation. She was a Thalian damsel who hung herself because her lover did not keep his promise of returning to marry her, and was accordingly changed into an almond tree. Phyllis was the name of Domitian’s nurse, and in process of time found her way among the dramatis personæ of Arcadian poetry; and arrived at being somewhat popular as a name in England.
CHAPTER IV.
HISTORICAL GREEK NAMES CONSISTING OF EPITHETS.
Section I.—Agathos.
After passing from the fascinating but confused tales and songs that group around the ship Argo, the doomed family of Œdipus, and the siege of Troy, the Greeks are well-nigh lost for a time, but emerge again in the full and distinct brilliancy of the narratives of Herodotus and his followers, who have rendered their small aggregate of fragmentary states and their gallant resistance to Asiatic invasion the great nucleus of interest in the ancient world.
In the days of these wise and brave men, the nomenclature was, for the most part, expressive and appropriate, consisting of compounds of words of good augury from the spoken language, and, usually, as has been before shown, with a sort of recurring resemblance, from generation to generation, so as to make the enumeration of a pedigree significant and harmonious.
Of these was ἀγαθός (the good), precisely the same word as our own good and the German guth, only with the commencing α and a Greek termination.
Classical times showed many an Agathon, and Agathias, and numerous compounds, such as Agathocles (good fame), to be repeated in the Teutonic Gudred, and other varieties; but the abiding use of the word as an European name was owing to a Sicilian girl, called Agatha, who in the Decian persecution was tortured to death at Rome. Sicily considered her as one of its guardian saints. Thus, the festival day of this martyred virgin is observed by both the Eastern and Western Churches, and her name is found among all the nations that ever possessed her native island. Greece has transmitted it to Russia, where the th not being pronounceable, it is called Agafia; and the masculine, which is there used, Agafon; and the Slavonian nations derive it from the same quarter. The Normans adopted it and sent it home to their sisters in Neustria, where it was borne by that daughter of William the Conqueror who was betrothed to the unfortunate Earl Edwin, and afterwards died on her way to a state marriage in Castille. In her probably met the Teutonic Gytha and the Greek Agatha, identical in meaning and root, and almost in sound, though they had travelled to her birth-place in Rouen by two such different routes from their Eastern starting-place. Agatha was once much more common as a name than at present in England, and seems still to prevail more in the northern than the southern counties. Haggy, or Agatha, is the maid-servant’s name in Southey’s Doctor, attesting its prevalence in that class before hereditary or peculiar names were discarded as at present.
France did not fail to take up Agatha. Spain had her Agatha like that of the Italians, both alike omitting the h of θ. Portugal makes it Agneda; and the only other change worth noting is that the Letts cut it short into Apka.
Aristos (best) was a favourite commencement with the Greeks. Aristides, most just of men, was thus called the son of the best. He has reappeared in his proper form in modern Greece; as Aristide in republican France; as Aristides in America.
Aristobulus (best counsel) came originally from an epithet of Artemis, to whom Themistocles built a temple at Athens, as Aristoboulè, the best adviser. It was very common in the various branches of the Macedonian empire, and was thus adopted in the Asmonean family, from whom it came to the Herodian race, and thence spread among the Jews. In the Epistle to the Romans, St. Paul sends his greetings to the household of Aristobulus; and Welsh ecclesiastical antiquaries endeavour to prove that Arwystli, whom the Triads say was brought by Bran the blessed to preach the Gospel in Britain, was the same with this person.
Aristarchus (best judge) is also a Scriptural name; and besides these we have Aristocles (best fame), Aristippos (best horse), Aristagoras (best assembly), and all the other usual Greek compounds among the Greeks.
Perhaps this is the fittest place to mention that Arethusa is in use among the modern Greeks, and interpreted by them to mean the virtuous, as coming from this source. Aretino has been used in Italy.[[34]]
[34]. Smith; Jameson; Rees, Welsh Saints.
Section II.—Alexander, &c.
Conquering Macedon was the portion of Greece, if Greece it could be called, that spread its names most widely and permanently; and as was but right, no name was more universally diffused than that of the great victor, he who in history is as prominent as Achilles in poetry. Ἀλέξανδρος (Alexandros), from ἀλέξω (alexo), to help, and ἄνδρες (andres), men, was said to have been the title given to Paris by the shepherds among whom he grew up, from his courage in repelling robbers from the flocks. It was afterwards a regular family name among the kings of Macedon, he who gave it fame being the third who bore it. So much revered as well as feared was this mighty conqueror, that his name still lives in proverb and song throughout the East. The Persians absolutely adopted him into their own line, and invented a romance by which ‘Secunder’ was made the son of a native monarch. Among the eastern nations, Iskander became such a by-word for prowess, that even in the sixteenth century the Turks would find no greater title of fear for their foe, the gallant Albanian, Georgios Kastriotes, than Skander Beg, or Lord Alexander.
Not only did the great conqueror possess many namesakes,—as indeed, there is a story that all the children born the year of his conquest of India were called after him,—but Alexandros was already frequent in Greece; and among the kingdoms formed out of the fragments of his empire, it recurred so as to become usual all over the Græcized East. Even the Maccabean Jews used it, and it was common in Judea, as well as elsewhere, in the time of the Gospels, so that a large proportion of saints and martyrs bore it and handed it on, especially in Greece and Italy. A pope, martyred in the second century, rendered it a papal assumed name; and the Italians used it frequently as Alessandro, shortened into Sandro. Nowhere, however, is it so thoroughly national as in Scotland, imported thither, apparently, with other Greek names, by Margaret Ætheling, who learnt them in the Hungarian court where she was born and brought up. Her third son was the first of the three Scottish Alexanders, under whom the country spent her most prosperous days.
No wonder his namesakes were numerous. In the Highlands they came to be Alaster, and formed the surname MacAlister; in the south, the contractions were Alick, Saunders, or Sandy, and the feminine Alexa, Alexandrina, and Alexandra, are chiefly German and Russian, though now and then occurring in France.
The first half of this name, Alexios, a defender, was in use in ancient Greece, where it belonged to a noted sculptor. Its saintly honours did not begin till the fifth century, when a young Roman noble, called Allexius or Alexis, is said to have been so much bent on a monastic life, that being compelled by his parents to marry, he fled away on his wedding day, and lived seventeen years in a convent in Syria; but, finding his reputation for sanctity too much for his humility, he came home in guise of a poor pilgrim, and spent another seventeen years as a beggar maintained on the scraps of his father’s kitchen, and constantly mocked and misused by the servants, until in his dying moments, he made himself known to his parents. His church at Rome, called St. Alessio, gives a title to a cardinal; and his day, July 17th, is observed by the Greeks as well as the Romans; and yet so strange is his history that it almost seems as if it might have been one of those instances in which an allegory acquired the name of a real saint, and attached itself to him as a legend. Alessio has in consequence always been an Italian name, and with the family of the Komnenoi, Alexios came into use among the Byzantine Greeks, with whom it was very frequent. Alexia is often found as a lady’s name in old records and accounts of the middle ages; but it is apparently intended merely as the Latin equivalent for Alice, which we shall show by-and-by to have had an entirely different origin.
| English. | Scotch. | French. | Italian. | Spanish. |
| Alexander | Alexander | Alexandre | Alessandro | Alejandro |
| Alex | Alick | |||
| Sanders | ||||
| Sandy | ||||
| Sawny | ||||
| Elshender | ||||
| Elshie | ||||
| Alaster | ||||
| Russian. | Polish. | Slavonic. | Ung. | |
| Aleksander | Aleksander | Aleksander | Sandor | |
| Ssachka | Leszek | Skender | ||
| Ssaschinka | ||||
| FEMININE[FEMININE] | ||||
| English. | Italian. | Portuguese. | Spanish. | |
| Alexis | Alessio | Aleixo | Alejo | |
| Alexis | ||||
| Alexe | ||||
| Russian. | Slavonic. | Servian. | Lusatian. | Hungarian. |
| Alexei | Ales | Aleksa | Alex | Elek |
| Alescha | Leks | Halex | ||
| Holex | ||||
Section III.—Anēr, Andros.
We come to the names derived from ἀνήρ, gen. ἀνδρός (anēr, andros), a man. The word itself has connections in the Sanscrit nara, and Zend ner; but its compounds are all from its oblique cases.
The most interesting of these is formed by the corrupt Greek dialect used in Syria, namely, that which fell to Ανδρέας (Andreas), the Galilean fisherman, whom the Church Universal reveres as one of the foremost in the Glorious Company of the Apostles. The saint was martyred at Patras in Achaia, whence some of his relics were carried in the fourth century to Scotland, and were thus the occasion of St. Andrew’s becoming the Metropolitan see. Shortly after, the vision of Hungus, King of the Picts, of St. Andrew’s Cross, promising him victory, rendered the white saltire the national ensign, and St. Andrew became not only the patron saint, but in due time the knightly champion of Scotland, and made Andrew one of the most universal of names, and the patronymic Anderson very common. The other relics went first to Constantinople, and after the taking of that city, were dispersed through Europe. Philip the Good, of Burgundy, obtained some of them, and made St. Andrew the patron of the order of the Golden Fleece, and Andreas became a frequent Flemish and Dutch name. It has a feminine in the countries where it is most popular, and its variations are as follows:—
| English. | Scotch. | Dutch. | Danish. |
| Andrew | Andrew | Andreas | Anders |
| Andy | Dandie | Andries | |
| Andries | |||
| French. | German. | Italian. | Spanish. |
| André | Andreas | Andrea | Andres |
| Andrien | |||
| Russian. | Slavonic. | Polish. | Bohemian. |
| Andrej | Andrej | Andrezej | Ondrej |
| Andias | Jedrzej | ||
| Necek | |||
| Andrejeek[Andrejeek] | |||
| Lusatian. | Esthonian. | Hungarian. | Lapland. |
| Handrej | Andras | Andras | Anta |
| Rajka | Andrus | Bandi | Attok |
| Hendrijshka | Ats |
The feminines are the French Andrée and Italian Andreana. The Russians use Andrean as an equivalent for Henry!
Andronicus, man’s victory, was a great favourite, and occurs in St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, probably having belonged to a Corinthian who had gone from the busy city of traffic on the Isthmus to the great Capital of the world. The name continued among the Greeks, and belonged to numerous emperors, but has not been subsequently in much favour.
Section IV.—Eu.
The word εὖ (well or happily) was the commencement of many a name of good augury from the earliest times, and mingles as much among Christian as among classical associations.
Thus in company with ἄγγελος, angelos (a messenger), it formed evangelus, happy messenger, or bearer of good tidings, the first time applied to a shepherd, who brought to Ephesus the tidings of a quarry of beautiful marble for the building of the temple that was the glory of the city and of all Asia. Adored with heroic honours as he was, the title must have seemed to the Ephesian Christians, above all, to befit those spiritual shepherds who brought the best of tidings, and Evangelista became the term for a preacher, as Evangelium of his doctrine, both becoming in time restricted to the four-writers of the personal history of our Lord, and their narrative, as being the very core and centre of the Good Tidings. Evangelista was an old Italian name; and Longfellow appears to have invented Evangeline for the heroine of his poem, whence many of the name have sprung up in America.
Εὔχειρ (Eucheir), dexterous hand, was no doubt at first a mere epithet of a sculptor, but afterwards considered as a name, and belonging to no less than four distinguished sculptors of ancient Greece.
Thence the Latinized Eucherius, which belonged to a Bishop of Lyons, a great author of ecclesiastical works, who died about A.D. 450; from him comes the Portuguese Euchario, the Italian Eucario, the French Euchaire, the Russian Jevcharij, the Polish Euckary.
Εὐδώρη (Eudora), happy gift, was one of the Nereids, and afterwards did duty as Eudore in French romance.
Eudocia and Eudoxia are so much alike as to be often confused, but have different significations. The first is Εὐδοκία (approval), the second Εὐδοξία (good fame of glory). Both were great favourites with the Greek empresses, and were assumed by imperial brides possessed of some appellation not supposed to befit the purple. Saints of the Greek Church handed Eudokhia on into Russia, where it has been worn upon the throne, and becomes in common parlance Jevdoksija.
Εὐγενή (Eugenes), well born, was a very old Greek author; but Eugenios was the more usual form in classical times, and was carried on as Eugenius by the Romans. St. Eugenius was an African Confessor, and another Eugenius was Bishop of Toledo in 646. Both these gave much popularity to their name; the first in the East, the second in Italy, where Eugênio came to that high-spirited Savoyard who, growing weary of lingering at the court of Louis XIV., and hearing himself called le petit Abbé du Roi, rendered the sound of Prince Eugène dear to Austria and England; terrible to France and Turkey. Foe as he was, it is to his fame that the great popularity of Eugène in France is owing, whilst even in the country for which he fought Eugen is far less common. The Russians have it as Jevgenij; and the Servians as Djoulija; indeed, well may these last remember the gallant prince who turned back the wave of Turkish invasion.
Eugenius stands forth again and again in the early roll of Scottish kings, but whether these sovereigns ever lived or not, their appellation was certainly not Eugenius, nor any corruption from it; but the Keltic Eoghan, Ewan, or Evan, still extremely common in the Highlands, and meaning a young warrior, though, after the favourite custom of the Gael, Anglicized and Latinized by names of similar sound. The Welsh Owain or Ywain appears to have had the same fate, as the first means a lamb; but this is not equally certain, as the British had many Latin and Greek names current among them, and this may be a corruption of Eugenius.
Eugenia was a virgin Roman martyr, of whom very little is known; but this convenient feminine for Eugène has been in favour in the countries where the masculine was popular, and the Empress Eugénie rendered it the reigning name in France.
The names beginning with this favourite adverb are almost beyond enumeration, and it is only possible to select those of any modern interest. Εὐνίκη (Eunike), Eunice, happy victory, was one of the fifty Nereids, from whom the name passed to Greek women, and thus to Eunice, the Jewish mother of Timothy, whence this has become a favourite with English lovers of Bible names.
John Bunyan would have been reminded of his town of Fair Speech by the number of Greeks called by words of this signification: Eulalius, Eulogius, Euphemius, all with their feminines, besides Euphrasia.
The feminines were more enduring than the masculines. Eulalia was a child of ten or twelve years old, who, with that peculiar exaggeration of feeling that distinguishes Spanish piety, made her escape from the place of safety where her parents had taken refuge, entered Merida, and proclaiming herself a Christian, was martyred with the utmost extremity of torture in the persecution of Diocletian, and was sung by the great Christian poet Prudentius, himself a Spaniard. His verses spread her fame into the East, where the Russians carry on her name as Jevlalija; the Servians, as Evlalija or Lelica. Another virgin martyr of the same name, under the same persecution, died at Barcelona, whence her relics spread into Guienne and Languedoc, and thus named the villages of Ste. Olaille, Ste. Aulazie, and Ste. Aulaire, the last a familiar seignoral title! Eulalia and Eulalie have been often used in Spain and France, and the former is found in the register of Ottery St. Mary, Devon—also frequently in Cornwall.
Euphemia originally meant at once fair speech and abstinence from the reverse, so that almost in irony it signified silence, and was applied to the stillness that prevailed during religious rites, or to the proclamation of silence. The Euphemia who was the parent of the wide-spread name, was a virgin-martyr of Bithynia, whose legend of constancy, unshaken and invulnerable, alike by lion and flame, strongly impressed both the East and the West. Jevfimija, in Russia; Jeva, in Servia; Bema, in Lusatia; and Pimmie, in Lithuania. Then she is almost as much changed as by the Effie and Phemie of Scotland, which together with Euphame have prevailed since very early times. It is a question whether this Scottish Euphame were really one of the Greek names brought from Hungary by Queen Margaret, or if it be only another attempt to translate the Keltic Aoiffe. In the Highlands, however, the name is called Oighrigh; which, to English eyes and ears, seems equally distant from either Aoiffe or Euphemia. The church of Santa Eufemia at Rome gives title to a cardinal, and has spread the name in Italy and France.
It remains somewhat doubtful whether Eustace should be referred to Εὐστᾶθηος[Εὐστᾶθηος] (steadfast), or to Εὔσταχος (happy in harvest). The Eostafie, or Eustathius, of the Greco-Slavonic Church, certainly has the same festival-day (September 20th) as the Eustachius of the Latin; but the Latin Church has likewise a St. Eustachius, a different personage with a different day. He of September 20th was a Roman soldier, who lived and suffered under the Emperor Adrian, but his wild poetical legend is altogether a work of the Western mind. It begins like that of St. Hubert, with his conversion by the apparition of a crucifix planted between the horns of a stag, and a voice telling him that he should suffer great things. A soldier saint was sure to be a great favourite in the middle ages, and the supposed transport of St. Eustace’s relics to St. Denis, in very early times, filled France with Eustache, and thence Eustace, Wistace, or Huistace, as English tongues were pleased to call it, came over in plenty at the Norman Conquest. Eustace ‘Comes,’ who holds land in Domesday Book before the Conquest, must have been he of Boulogne who had such a desperate quarrel with the Godwin sons. There were six householders of this name after the Conquest, and they, or their descendants, sometimes called their daughters Eustachie, or Eustachia. Eustachia, a kinswoman of Henry II., married Geoffrey de Mandeville; and Eustacie was once in favour in France; but all these have a good deal lost their popularity, though we sometimes hear of Eustace in these days. The Bavarian contraction is Staches. Eusebius and Eusebia mean gentle or holy, and have not been frequent.[[35]]
Section V.—Hieros.
The word ἵερος (hieros), sacred, gave the term for a priest, or any other person or thing set apart, and thus formed several names in the family of the kings of Syracuse, Hieron, Hieracles (holy fame), Hieronymus, i. e. Ἱερώνυμος (with a holy name). These continued in use among the Greeks, and came at length to that Dalmatian scholar and hermit, Eusebius Hieronymus Sophronius, who is reckoned as one of the greatest of the Latin fathers. As a saint of high reputation, his name underwent the Italian process of changing its aspirate into a G, and he became San Geronimo, or even Girolamo, whence the French took their frequent Jerome, and we followed their example. The Germans did indeed hold fast to Hieronymus; and the old English reformers would quote St. Hierom; but Jerome is the abiding name by which the saint, his namesakes, and the friars who took his rule are called.
In Ireland, Jerome, like Jeremiah and Edward, has been forced into representing the good old Keltic Diarmaid.
| English. | Portuguese. | Spanish. | Italian |
| Hierom | Jeromino | Jeromo | Geronimo |
| Hieronimo | Jeromino | Girolamo | |
| French. | Russian. | Polish. | Servian |
| Jerôme | Jeronim | Hieronim | Jerolim |
| Hirus | Jerko |
In Cambrai, Hieronome was the form, with the Hieronomette for a feminine; and among the Swinburnes of Yorkshire, in the seventeenth century, Jeronima thrice occurs.[[36]]
[35]. Liddell and Scott; Smith; Jameson; Sir Isumbras; Ellis, Domesday Book; Michaelis.
[36]. Grimm; Smith; Scott.
Section VI.—Pan.
A few words beginning with πᾶς (all) must here be mentioned, such as Pankratios (all ruling). A boy thus called is said to have suffered at Rome, in his 14th year, in 304, under Diocletian. Even in the time of Gregory of Tours, it was supposed that certain vengeance followed false oaths made at his shrine, and his relics were therefore very valuable. A present of some from Pope Vitalian to our King Oswy brought St. Pancras into fashion in England, and Pancrace and Pancragio have also named many churches in France and Italy. The lily called pancratium claims by its name to excel all others.
Πανταλέων, Pantaleon (altogether a lion), was one of the numerous Christian physicians who suffered martyrdom. He died at Nicodemia, but his relics were brought to Constantinople, and thence to France, where he is the chief saint of the largest church at Lyons, and he is the patron of doctors next after St. Luke. His name was in use in France and Italy before. As a peasant name, he fell, with Arlechino and Colombina, into comedy. His dress was on the stage made to fit tight to his body, as if all in one piece, and he was always a feeble old man, whence Shakespeare speaks of the lean and slippered pantaloon. Thence again, when the entire leg was covered by the trousers instead of by stockings and breeches meeting at the knee, the name of pantaloon was applied to the new garment.
Νίκη (victory) was an auspicious word, which, being of feminine gender, as befitted a goddess, was a favourite close for women’s names; such as Stratonike (army victory), Φερενίκη, Pherenike (bringing victory). Berenike was the Macedonian pronunciation of this last, and was in constant use among princesses of the two Greek kingdoms of Syria and Egypt. From these ladies, those of the Herod family took the name, and thus it was borne by that Bernice who heard St. Paul’s defence. Oddly enough, the peasants of Normandy are fond of calling their daughters Berenice. Veronica is sometimes said likewise to be a corrupt form.
In men’s names Nike was the prefix, as in Nikon, Niklias, Nikodemos (conquering people), Nikolaos (Νίκολαος), a word of like meaning. This last, after belonging to one of the seven first deacons, and to the founder of a heresy doomed in the Apocalypse, came to the Bishop of Myra, from whom it acquired a curious legendary fame that made it universal. St. Nicholas is said to have supplied three destitute maidens with marriage portions by secretly leaving money at their window, and as his day occurred just before Christmas, he thus was made the purveyor of the gifts of the season to all children in Flanders and Holland, who put out their shoe or stocking in the confidence that Santa Klaus or Knecht Clobes, as they call him, will put in a prize for good conduct before the morning. The Dutch element in New England has introduced Santa Klaus to many a young American who knows nothing of St. Nicholas or of any saint’s day. Another legend described the saint as having brought three murdered children to life again, and this rendered him the patron of boys, especially school-boys.
A saint of both the East and West, with a history so endearing, and legends still more homely and domestic, Nicholas was certain of many followers throughout Christendom, and his name came into use in Europe among the first of the sainted ones. To us it came with the Norman Conquest, though not in great abundance, for only one Nicolas figures in Domesday Book, but his namesakes multiplied. The only English pope was Nicolas Breakspear; and Nicole or Nicola de Camville was the brave lady who defeated the French invaders at Lincoln, and secured his troublesome crown to Henry III. She deserves to have had more ladies called after her in her own country, but the feminines are chiefly confined to France, where, in the fifteenth century, its contraction was beatified in the person of a shoemaker’s daughter, Collette Boilet, who reformed the nuns of St. Clara, and died in the odour of sanctity. The southern nations almost always contract their names by the omission of the first syllables, as the northern ones do by leaving out the latter ones; and thus, while the English have Nick, the Italians speak of Cola, a contraction that became historical when the strange fortunes of “Cola di Rienzi, the tribune of the people,” raised him to his giddy height of honour, and then dashed him down so suddenly and violently, that “You unfortunate Rienzi” has ever since been a proverbial expression of pity in Italy.
The French language generally has both varieties of contractions, perhaps according as it was influenced by the Provençal or the Frank pronunciation, and thus its Nicolas becomes Nicole or Colas, sometimes Colin. Thence it has been suggested that Colin Maillard, or blind-man’s-buff, may be Colin seeking Maillard, the diminutive of Marie, which would drolly correspond to the conjecture that the “N or M” of our catechism and marriage service, instead of being merely the consonants of nomen, stand for Nicholas and Mary as the most probable names. The French Colin is probably Nicolas, and is the parent of all the Arcadian Colins who piped to their shepherdesses either in the rural theatricals of the ancient regime, in Chelsea china, or in pastoral poetry. The Scottish Colin may, perhaps, have been slightly influenced by French taste, but he bears no relation to Nicolas, being, in fact, formed from the Irish missionary, Saint Columba. The true Scottish descendant of the patron of scholars is to be found in that quaint portrait, Baillie Nicol Jarvie. The h with which Nicolas is usually spelt in English was probably introduced in the seventeenth century, which seemed to think good spelling consisted in the insertion of superfluous letters.
Niel, a pure Keltic word, which was adopted by the Northmen, and became naturalized in Scandinavia and Normandy, has also been translated by Nicolas, but quite incorrectly. Nils is the only real Nicolaus except Klaus used in the North, though Niel, and even Nigel, are sometimes confounded with it. Denmark has had a King Klaus; otherwise this popular name has only been on the throne in the instance of that great Tzar whom we had respected till the last year of his life, when his aggression forced us into war.
| English. | Scotch. | French. | Danish. |
| Nicholas | Nicol | Nicolas | Nikolaus |
| Nick | Nicole | Niklaas | |
| Nicol | Colas | Colin | Klaus |
| Nils | |||
| Dutch. | German. | Bavarian. | |
| Niklaas | Nikolaus | Niklau | Swiss. |
| Klasse | Niklas | Nickel | Chlaus |
| Klaus | Likelas | ||
| Nikolaus | Klasl | ||
| Niklas | |||
| Klaus | |||
| Italian. | Portuguese. | Russian. | Slavonic. |
| Nicola | Nicolaio | Nikolaj | Nikola |
| Nicolo | Nikolascha | Miklaoz | |
| Cola | Kolinka | ||
| Kolja | |||
| Polish. | Lett. | Finland. | Ung. |
| Mikolej | Klavinsh | Laus | Mikos |
| Klassis | Nilo | Lapland. | |
| Niku | Nikka |
The German Sieg answers exactly to the Greek Nike.
With the a before it, which in Greek contradicts the ensuing word, like the Latin in, and Teutonic un, we have Ἀνίκητoς, Aniketos, Anicetus, unconquered, the name of a pope, a friend of St. Polycarp, and an opponent of heresy, whence he is a saint both of East and West, and is called Aniceto at Rome, Anicet in France, and Anikita in Russia.[[37]]
[37]. Liddell and Scott; Rollin; Jameson; Butler; Michaelis; Ellis, Domesday Book; Warton, English Poetry.
Section VII.—Polys.
Πoλύς (Polys), much, very, or many, was a frequent opening for Greek names. Polydoros (Πoλύδωρος), many-gifted, was the youngest and last survivor of the sons of Priam; and as mediæval Europe had a strong feeling for the fate of Troy, and the woes of ‘Polydore’ had an especial attraction for them, so Polidoro was revived in Italy, and has never quite died away.
His sister Polyxena, the feminine of very hospitable, had an equally piteous fate, being slain by the Greeks at the tomb of Achilles. According to the legends of the Eastern Church, a lady named Eusebia (gentle), who had been born at Rome, fled from an enforced marriage with a king, and took refuge, first at Alexandria, and then in the Isle of Cos, where she was called Xena, or the stranger. She founded a monastery at Mylassa in Caria, and there died in the 5th century. Kseenia, as she is called in Russia, has many namesakes, and probably was made ornamental by being lengthened into Poliksenja, which is likewise in use, with the contraction Polinka; and Polixene has also been used from an early period in Germany.
Πολύευκτος (Polyeuctos), much longed for, answering to the Desiderio of Italy, and Desirée of France, was an old classic name, and an officer who was martyred in Lesser Armenia about the middle of the third century, was placed in the martyrology of both East and West; but only has namesakes in Russia, where he is called Polieukt.
Πολύκαρπος (Polycarpos), that glorious Bishop of Smyrna, “faithful unto death,” and “receiving a crown of life when he played the man in the fire,” has had still fewer imitators of his suitable Christian name, much-fruit.
Section VIII.—Phile, &c.
Φίλος (Philos) was a most obvious and natural opening for names. It stood alone as that of several Macedonian ladies, and again with numerous men called Philon.
Philemon (loving thought) was the good old Phrygian who, with his wife Baucis, entertained Zeus and Hermes, and were rewarded with safety when their churlish neighbours were destroyed. Philemon was very common among the Greeks, and the Epistle of St. Paul to the Colossian master of the runaway Onesimus, has made it one of the Scriptural names of the English. The Maories call it Pirimona.
The Ptolemys of Egypt were particularly fond of surnaming themselves after their love to their relations, though they generally contrived so to treat them as to make the epithet sound ironical: Ptolemy Philadelphos (love brother), because he murdered his brother; Ptolemy Philopater, because he poisoned his father; though at least Philometer does seem to have had a good mother, and to have loved her. Such surnames were imitated by the Greek kings of Pergamus, all of whom were named Attalus, and it was from Attalus Philadelphus[Philadelphus], the second of them, that the city of Philadelphia, mentioned in the Apocalypse, took its title. This perished city of brotherly love seemed to William Penn to afford a suitable precedent for the title of the capital of his Quaker colony, which has ever since been Philadelphia. Less happily, Philadelphia has even been used among English women, apparently desirous of a large mouthful of a name.
Whether Philadelphia set the fashion, or whether the length of name is the allurement, Americans have a decided turn for all these commencements with ‘Phile’; and Philetus, Philander, &c., are to be found continually among the roughest inhabitants of the backwoods and far-west. With us they are at a discount, probably owing to the fashion of the last century of naming imaginary characters from the qualities they possessed.
Philaret, fond of virtue, is however popular in Russia, for the sake of some Eastern saint, who no doubt derived it from Philaretos, a Greek physician.
The verb πράσσω (prasso), to do or act, and the substantives πρᾶγμα (pragma), πρᾶξις (praxis), business, were fertile in derivatives.
The Christian interest of the words from this source is through Praxedes, who, according to the legend, was the daughter of the house in which St. Peter lodged at Rome, and devoted herself, together with her sister, to attending on Christians in prison, and burying them when they were put to death; a course of life that resulted in a glorious martyrdom. In honour of these two faithful women was built one of the first churches of Rome, consecrated, it is said, as early as 141, and still existing in all the glory of its ancient mosaics. Santa Prassede, as modern Rome terms it, gives title to a cardinal; and the admirable Carlo Borromeo was thus distinguished, deserving, perhaps, more than any other known ‘hinge-priest’ of Rome to be called after the saint of holy activity. Prassede has continued in vogue among Italian women, who frequently learn their names from Roman churches. I have found Plaxy in Cornwall, possibly from this source. Here, too, we should place Anysia (Ἀνύσια), from ἀνύω (anuo), to accomplish or complete. She was a maiden of Thessalonica, put to death there under Maximian. Her day is the 30th of October, in the Greek calendar, and Annusia is a Russian name, but she is not in the Roman calendar; and how the Normans heard of her it is hard to guess, unless it was either from the Sicilian Greeks, or in the Crusades; nevertheless, we are often met by Annys, Anisia, Annice, or Annes, in older pedigrees. The latter form occurs down to 1597 in the registers of the county of Durham. In later times the form was absorbed by Anne.
Τροφή, Trophe (food or nourishment), formed Τρόφιμος, Trophimos (the fruitful or nourishing), the name of an old Greek sculptor, and afterwards of the Ephesian companion of St. Paul who was left sick at Miletus. The people at Arles consider that he afterwards preached the Gospel in their city, and have made him the patron of their cathedral; but it is Russia that continues the use of his name as Trofeem.[[38]]
Even among the heathen Greeks, Τρυφή, Tryphe (daintiness, softness, or delicacy), had not a respectable signification. Yet Τρύφον, or Tryphon, was a favourite with persons of inferior rank—artists, architects, and physicians; and in the Decian persecution, a martyr so called was put to the extremity of torture in Bithynia, and has remained highly honoured in the calendar of the Greek Church; Trypho continuing in use as a Russian name.
The feminine form, Τρυφαίνα (Tryphæna), was given to two of the daughters of the Ptolemys in Egypt, where it was far from inappropriate; but, probably, the two women whom St. Paul greets so honourably at Rome as Tryphæna and Tryphosa, were either Alexandrian Jewesses whom he had met at Corinth on their way to Rome, or else merely so called as being the daughters of some Tryphon. They were not canonized, and the dainty Tryphæna has only been revived in England by the Puritan taste.
Section IX.—Names connected with the Constitution.—Laos, &c.
The democratic Greeks delighted in names connected with their public institutions—ἀγορά (agora), the assembly, δῆμος (dêmos), the public, λαός, also the people, gave them numerous names, with which were closely connected the formations from δίκη (dike), justice, and κλέος (kleos), fame.
Λαοδάμας (Laodamas), people-tamer, had a feminine Λαοδάμεια[Λαοδάμεια] (Laodameia), principally noted for the beautiful legend of her bitter grief for her husband, the first to fall at Troy, having recalled him to earth for three hours under the charge of Hermes. Probably Florence must have had a local saint named Laodamia, for it has continued in vogue there.
The demos better answered to the commons; they expressed less the general populace than the whole voting class of free citizens, and were more select. We find them often at the beginning or end of Greek names, like the Theut of the Teutons: Demodokos, people’s teacher; Demoleon, people’s lion; Nikodemos, conquering people, etc.
Κλέος (Kleos), fame, from κλείω (kleio), to call, had as many derivatives as the Frank hlod, or loud, for renowned, but most of them have passed out of use, though Κλεάνθης (Kleanthes), famous bloom, the name of a celebrated sculptor, so struck the fancy of the French that Cleanthe—their epicene form—was one of the favourite soubriquets for their portraits of living characters. Even Cleopatra (Κλεοπάτρα[Κλεοπάτρα]), fame of her father, with all her beauty and fame, did not hand on the name which she had received in common with a long course of daughters of Egypto-Greek kings. Russia alone accepts it as a frequent Christian name, and it is occasionally to be found in England and America.
The wreath of the conqueror was an appropriate allusion to those games where the Greek youth delighted to contend, and very probably the first Stephanos (Στέφανος) was so called by an exulting family whose father had returned with the parsley, or pine-leaf, crown upon his brow, and named the infant in honour of the victory. For Stephanos was an old Greek name, which had belonged among others to a son of Thucydides, before it came to that Hellenist deacon who first of all achieved the greatest of all the victories, and won the crown.
Besides St. Stephen’s own day, another on the 3rd of August for “the invention of St. Stephen’s relics,” which were pointed out in a dream to a priest of Caphargamala in the year 415, by no less a person than the Jewish doctor, Gamaliel, in a white robe, covered with plates of gold. The bones were carried to the church on Mount Sion, and thence dispersed into all quarters; even St. Augustin rejoiced in receiving a portion at Hippo, other fragments were taken to the Balearic Isles, while Ancona laid claim to the possession of a bone, carried off at the time of the saint’s martyrdom!
No wonder the name is common. Seven saints bore it besides the proto-martyr, and among them, that admirable King of Hungary, who endeared it to his people, and left the crown so highly honoured at Prague. Our name of Stephen is probably due to the acquaintance of the Normans with Ancona, whence William the Conqueror obtained such interest in St. Stephen as to dedicate to him the Abbey built at Caen. There is no instance of the name in Domesday Book, and our king of turbulent memory derived it from his father, the Count de Blois. In the roll of Winchester householders in Stephen’s reign we find, however, already Stephen de Crickeled and “Stephen the Saracen.” Could this last have been a convert brought home from the East, and baptized in honour of the pious Count de Blois, father of the king—perhaps an adherent of the family? It is everywhere in use, varied according to the manner in which the tongue treated the double consonant. The feminine began at Cambrai at least as early as the thirteenth century, and it is frequent in Caen, probably in honour of St. Stephen’s Abbey at Caen.
| English. | German. | French. | Italian. |
| Stephen | Stephan | Etienne | Stefano |
| Steffel | Tiennon | Steffano | |
| Tiennot | |||
| Estevennes | |||
| Spanish. | Portuguese. | Dutch. | Russian. |
| Estevan | Estevao | Steven | Stefan |
| Esteban | Stepan | ||
| Stenka | |||
| Stepka | |||
| Polish. | Illyrian. | Esthonian. | Hungarian. |
| Sscezepan | Stepan | Tewa | Istvan |
| Lusatian. | Stepo | ||
| Scezpan | Stepko | ||
| Stepika | |||
| FEMININE. | |||
| English. | French. | Portuguese. | Russian. |
| Stephan | Estephanie | Estephania | Stefanida |
| Stefanie | German. | ||
| Etiennette | Stephanine | ||
| Tiennette | |||
I venture here to include the numerous names of which the leading word is Ὀλυμπ. They are generally derived from Mount Olympos, the habitation of the gods; but I cannot help thinking them more likely to be connected with the Olympian games, and to have been first invented for children born in the year of an Olympiad.
There were numerous varieties, but none have survived except the feminine Olympias, belonging to the proud but much beloved mother of Alexander, and, like all other Macedonian names, spreading through the East. A Byzantine widow, of great piety and charity, who stood faithful to St. Chrysostom during his persecution by the empress, was canonized, and sent Olympias on to be a favourite with the Greeks, so that it flourishes among all ranks in the Ionian Islands. Italy had her Olimpia, probably through the Greek connections of Venice; and the noble and learned Olimpia Morata rendered it famous. It was brought to France by the niece of Mazarin, the Comtesse de Soissons, of evil fame as a poisoner, and yet the mother of Prince Eugène. From her, apparently, Olympe spread among French ladies and long continued fashionable, and Surtee’s History of the County Palatine of Durham mentions an Olympia Wray, married in 1660.
Here, too, must be mentioned Milone, though its connection with the subject is only through Milon, the famous Greek wrestler of Crotona, who carried a heifer through the Stadium at Olympia, and afterwards ate her up in a single meal; killed a bull with one stroke of his fist; and finally, was caught by the hands in the recoil of a riven oak, and there imprisoned till eaten by the wolves. Michaelis thinks the root of the word is the same with that of the old German verb milan, to beat or crush, the relation of our mills. Thence may likewise have come the Latin Miles, and the Keltic Milidh, both meaning a warrior.
Milo belonged to the realms of romance. In the story of the Golden Ass of Apuleius, Milon is the master of the house where the unfortunate hero undergoes his transformation; and having thus entered the world of imagination, Milon, or Milone as Italian poets call him, became a paladin of Charlemagne; Milan was a Welsh knight in one of Marie of Bretagne’s lays; and in a curious old French romance, Miles is the father of two children, one of whom is brought up by a lion, and defended by an ape as his champion. These stories, or their germs, must have struck the Norman fancy, for a Milo appears among the newly installed landholders in Domesday Book, and Milo Fitzwilliam stands early in the Essex pedigrees, but very soon the vernacular form became Miles. Among the Norman settlers in Ireland, Miles was a frequent name; and in the Stanton family, when it had become so thoroughly Hibernicized as to dislike the Norman appellation, one branch assumed the surname of MacAveely, son of Milo, according to the change of pronunciation undergone by Erse consonants in the genitive. Miles or Myles itself was adopted as an English equivalent for the native Erse Maelmordha, or majestic chief, and has now become almost an exclusively Irish name, though sometimes used in England by inheritance from Norman ancestors, and generally incorrectly derived from the Latin Miles, whereas its immediate parent is certainly the Greek Milo.[[39]]
[38]. Butler; Surius; Sir Cuthbert Sharpe, Extracts from Parish Registers.
[39]. Liddell and Scott; Butler; Neale, Hymns of the Greek Church; Smith; Dunlop, History of Fiction; Hanmer, Chronicle of Ireland; Publications of Irish and Ossianic Societies.
CHAPTER V.
CHRISTIAN GREEK NAMES.
Section I.
The names that we place in this class are such as arose under the Christian dispensation. Some, indeed, are older, and many more may be so, and may have been in use among slaves, peasants, and persons of whom history took no cognizance; but the great mass, even if previously invented, were given with a religious meaning and adaptation, and many embodied ideas that no heathen could have devised. Greek, above all others the ecclesiastical tongue, has sent forth more widely diffused names of truly Christian meaning than any other language; the formations of Latin, German, and English, in imitation of these are, in comparison, inharmonious and ungainly, carrying their meaning too openly displayed.
Among these are here mixed, when they belong evidently to the same race, the exclusively modern Greek names, which have arisen since Greece and her dependencies ceased to be the great store-house of martyrs and saints, and the dispenser of sacred thought to the Christian world. Many, indeed, of these names may be of equally ancient date, only not belonging to any individual of sufficient renown to have transmitted them to other countries.
Perhaps no land has been less beholden to others in her nomenclature than modern Greece. Hebrew names have, indeed, come in through her religion; a very few were accepted from the Latin in the days when Constantinople was the seat of the Roman empire, and when the churches were one; but scarcely one of the wide-spread ‘Frank’ names has ever been adopted by the Greeks. Even in Slavonic Russia the nomenclature remains almost exclusively Byzantine; the native Slave names are comparatively few, and those that come in from other nations are discarded, as at Constantinople, for some supposed Greek equivalent.
Section II.—Names from Theos.
Already in speaking of Zeus it has been explained that this and Θεός (Theos) are but differing forms of the same term for Divinity, although one became restricted to the individual Deity; the other was a generic term in heathen days, retaining, however, so much of spiritual majesty that it was employed in the Septuagint to express the true Creator, and thus Christians embraced it as the designation of the supreme object of worship.
The word Theos itself had been assumed as a surname by one of the worst of the line of the Syrian Antiochus, and Theon had never been infrequent among the Greeks. Θεόφιλος (Theophilos), God-beloved, to whom is dedicated the Gospel of St. Luke, must have been so called before his Christianity. Thenceforward Theophilus became a name in the Church; but it has been less used on the Continent than in England. There, probably from its occurrence in Holy Scripture, and also from being generally the title of the favourite speaker in religious dialogues, it has been in some use. The feminine, Theophila, was the name of the mother of Sir Joshua Reynolds.
| English. | French. | Italian and Spanish. | Portuguese. |
| Theophilus | Théophile | Teofilo | Theophilo |
Theokles (Θέοκλής), divine fame, was an ancient heathen name, and it is most probable that [Θεκλα] (Thekla) is the contraction of the feminine. St. Thekla was said to have been a disciple of St. Paul, at Inconium, and to have been exposed to lions at Antioch. Though they crouched at her feet instead of tearing her, she is considered as the first virgin martyr, and it was deemed that the highest possible praise for a woman was to compare her to St. Thekla. Another Thekla of Alexandria is believed to have been the scribe of that precious copy of the Gospels given by Cyril Lucar to Charles I., and now in the British Museum; and thus Thekla has always had high reputation in the East, though less known in the West, except that ‘Tecla’ is the patroness of Tarragona.
| German. | French. | Italian. | Russian |
| Thekla | Técla | Tecla | Tjokle |
Θεόδορος (Theodoros), and Θεόδορα (Theodora), divine gift, are the most usual of these names; the first universal in the East and West, the second prevalent in the Eastern Church, but less common in the Western than the incorrect feminine Dorothea.
There were numerous saints called Theodorus; the favourite of the West being he of Heraclea, a young soldier, who burnt the temple of Cybele, and was martyred in consequence. The Venetians brought home his legend, and made him their champion and one of their patron saints, whence Teodoro has prevailed in the city of the Doge; and from a church dedicated to him at Rome the Spaniards must have taken their Teodor, the French their Théodore, and the Germans the similar Theodor, which has always been frequent there.
The ancient Britons must have known and used this name; for among their host of obscure saints of princely birth appears Tewdwr; and the Welsh made so much use of this form that when the handsome Owen ap Tewdwr won the heart of the widow of Harry of Monmouth, Tudor was an acknowledged surname, and in two generations more it became a royal one.
Here, however, the Theodores are a recent introduction. They seem only to have been really hereditary in Wales, Greece, and Venice. By Greece is also meant all those Greco-Slavonic countries that received their nomenclature from Constantinople, in especial Russia, where the th is exchanged for ph, so as to produce the word Feodor; and the Germans, receiving it again, spell it Pheodor.
| Welsh. | French. | Portuguese. | Spanish and Italian. |
| Tewdwr | Théodore | Theodoro | Teodoro |
| English. | |||
| Theodore | |||
| German. | Hamburg. | Russian. | Polish. |
| Theodor | Tedor | Feodor | Feodor |
| Pheodor | Tetje | Fedor | |
| Slavonic. | Illyrian. | Lett. | Hungarian. |
| Todor | Todor | Kodders | Twador |
| Toso | Kwedders | Finland. | |
| Theotari |
The feminine Theodora has two independent saints, a martyr and a Greek empress. It suffers no alterations except the Russian F at the commencement, and is not common except in the East. The West prefers the name reversed, and rendered incorrect. Dorotheus and Theodorus may indeed be exact equivalents; but the invention of Theodora makes the giver feminine instead of the gift. It is the beauty of the legend of St. Dorothea that has made her name so great a favourite. Never did pious fancy form a more beautiful dream than the story of the Cappadocian maiden, who sent the roses of paradise by angelic hands as a convincing testimony of the joy that she was reaping. The tale is of western growth, and the chief centre of St. Dorothea’s popularity as a patroness was in Germany; but the name was likewise in great favour in England, where Massinger composed a drama on her story. Dorothy was once one of the most usual of English names; and ‘Dolly’ was so constantly heard in every household, that it finally became the generic term for the wooden children that at least as late as the infancy of Elizabeth Stuart, were called babies or puppets. In the days of affectation, under the House of Hanover, Dorothy fell into disuse, but was regarded as of the same old Puritan character as Abigail or Tabitha. Probably from the influence of German literature, the German contraction Dora, or more properly Dore, has come in as almost an independent name, which, perhaps, ought to be translated as simply a gift, though often used as a contraction for Dorothea. The fashion has again come round, and Dorothy has become the favourite name. In the last century, Dorinda was a fashionable English fancy embellishment, Doralice a French one—perhaps from the German Dorlisa—Dorothea Elisa. The Russian Darija is reckoned as a translation; but it does not seem probable, for the patroness of this latter was an Athenian lady, martyred with her husband, Chrysanthus, at Rome, and buried in a catacomb, which was opened in the days of Constantine the Great. The modern Greeks call the name, Thorothea.
| English. | French. | German. | Bavarian. |
| Dorothea | Dorothée | Dorothea | Derede |
| Dorothy | Dorette | Dore | Duredel |
| Dolly | Doralice | Dorlisa | Durl |
| Dora | Dorothea | ||
| Dorinda | Dore | ||
| Dorlisa | |||
| Swiss. | Dutch. | Danish. | Spanish. |
| Torli | Dört | Daarte | Dorotea |
| Dortchen | |||
| Portuguese. | Italian. | Russian. | Polish. |
| Dorothe | Dorotea | Dorofei | Dorota |
| Darija | Dorosia | ||
| Darha | |||
| Daschenka | |||
| Dorka | |||
| Illyrian. | Lusatian. | Lett. | Esthonian. |
| Doroteja | Dora | Darte | Tigo |
| Dora | Horta | Tike | Tio |
| Rotija | Horteja | Tiga | |
| Horta | Vortija | ||
| Lithuanian. | Ung. | ||
| Urte | Doroltya |
Before leaving the word doros, we may mention the name Isidoros, a very old and frequent one among the ancient Greeks, and explained by some to mean Gift of Isis; but this Egyptian deity is an improbable origin for a name certainly in use before the Greek kingdom in Egypt was established, and it seems more satisfactory to refer the first syllable to ἰς (strength), a word which when it had its digamma was Γις, exactly answering to the Latin vis (force or strength). It commenced many old Greek names, but none that have passed on to Christian times except Isidorus, which was first borne by one of the grim hermits of Egypt, then by an Alexandrian author, and then by three Spanish bishops of Cordova, Seville, and Badajos. They probably received it as a resemblance of the Gothic names beginning with eisen (iron). In consequence, Isidoro and the feminine Isidora have continued national in Spain, and Isodoros in Greece, whence Russia has taken Eesidor.
Theodotos (God-given) was in common use among the Greeks of the early empire, and apparently in Spain was corrupted into Theodosius, since Spain was the native land of him who rendered this form illustrious. Theodosia has been in favour in many parts of Europe, copied probably from some of the Byzantine princesses. The canonized personages of the masculine and feminine forms are, however, by no means imperial; the one being a hermit, the other a virgin martyr. Theone is also a German feminine.
| English. | French. | Italian. | |
| Theodosius | Théodose | Teodosia | |
| English. | Italian. | Russian. | Illyrian. |
| Theodosia | Teodosia | Feodosia | Desse |
The entire race of Greek words thus derived must be carefully distinguished from the Gothic ones, which at first sight appear to resemble them: such as Theodoric, Theudebert, &c., but are all, in fact, taken from the Teuton word Theut (the people).
Of Theophanos we shall speak among the names taken from sacred festivals, but we must not leave these titles of pious signification without mentioning Τιμόθεος (honour God), from τιμὴ (honour or worship), the noun formed from τίω (to honour or esteem), connected of course with the Latin timor (fear).
Timotheus had been in use even in heathen times, as in the case of Alexander’s musician.
But probably it was with a full religious meaning that the good Eunice chose it for that son who was to be the disciple of St. Paul and the first bishop of Ephesus. From him, and from several subsequent Saints, the East and West both learnt it, but at the present day it flourishes chiefly in Russia as Teemofe. In Ireland, it was taken as one of the equivalents of the native Tadgh (a bard), and the absurdities of Irish Tims have cast a ridiculous air over it, mingled with the Puritan odour of the Cromwellian days, such as to lower it from the estimation its associations deserve. Mr. Timothy Davison, in 1670, named his daughter Timothea, but happily his example does not seem to have been followed.[[40]]
| English. | French. | Italian. | Russian. |
| Timothy | Timothée | Timoteo | Timofei |
| Tim | Timoscha | ||
| Polish. | Slavonic. | Lett. | |
| Tymotensz | Timoty | Tots | |
| Timoty | |||
[40]. Smith; Jameson; Butler; Liddell and Scott; Hartwell Horne, Introduction to the Bible; Le Beau, Bas Empire; Michaelis.
Section III.—Names from Christos.
The Greek verb χρίω (chrio), to touch, rub, or anoint, formed the term Χριστός, which translated the old Hebrew prophetic Messiah (the Anointed), and thence became the title of the Saviour, the very touch-stone of faith.
Therefore it was that at Antioch the disciples came to be called Χρίστιανοι (Christianoi), a Greek word with a Latin termination, the title that they accepted as their highest glory, and which has ever since been the universal and precious designation of a believer. The first person who is known to have been baptized after this title, was St. Christina, a Roman virgin of patrician birth, who was martyred in 295. Her marvellous legend declares that she was thrown into lake Bolsena, with a mill-stone round her neck, but that she floated to the surface, supported by angels, and that she was at last shot to death with arrows. She is therefore, of course, patroness of Bolsena and of the Venetian States, where Cristina is frequent; and her fame travelled to Greece, Bohemia, and Hungary, from which last place the Atheling family brought it to England and Scotland in the person of Christina, Abbess of Romsey. Christian, like the other Greek names of this importation, took deep root in Scotland, where Kirstin is its abbreviation among the peasantry; and Christina, or Stine, and Tine, is common in Germany. John Bunyan’s Christiana, as the feminine of his allegorical Christian, has made this form the most common in England. Christine, either through Germany or Scotland, found its way to Scandinavia, where the contraction is Kirste, or Kirstine. Being vigorous name-makers at the time of their conversion, the Northmen were not content to leave this as a mere lady’s name inherited from the saint, but invented for themselves a masculine Christian, or Christiern as they call it in Denmark, which has belonged to many a sovereign in that kingdom, where it is especially national, and contracts into Kirsten.
Christabel was already a name before Coleridge’s time. It is to be found in Cornwall, in 1727, and in the North of England. It occurs at Crayke, in Yorkshire, between 1538 and 1652.
| English. | German. | French. | Swedish. |
| Christian | Christian | Chrestien | Kristian |
| Chrétien | |||
| Danish. | Netherlands. | Dantzig. | Frisian. |
| Christian | Kerstan | Zan | Tsassen |
| Karston | Dutch. | Tziasso | |
| Krischân | Korstiaan | Zasso | |
| Kruschan | Sasze | ||
| Swiss. | Polish. | Slavonic. | Illyrian. |
| Krista | Krystyan | Kristijan | Kristian |
| Chresta | Kersto | ||
| Chresteli | Hristo | ||
| Lusatian. | Bulgarian. | Lett. | Esthonian. |
| Khrystjan | Krustjo | Kristo | Kersti |
| Kristo | Skersto | Hungarian. | |
| Kito | Kerestel | ||
| FEMININE. | |||
| English. | French. | German. | Bulgarian. |
| Christiana | Christine | Christiane | Khrustina |
| Christian | Christine | Lithuanian. | |
| Christina | Stine | Krikszte | |
| Chrissie | Tine | ||
| Xina | Kristel | ||
| Portuguese. | Spanish. | Italian. | Danish. |
| Christinha | Cristine | Cristina | Karstin |
| Slavonic. | Lusatian. | Lett. | Esthonian. |
| Kristina | Krystla | Kristine | Kirstin |
| Kina | Kita | Kersti | Kirste |
| Kitka | Skersten | ||
From the same holy title was derived that of Χριστοφόρος (Christ-bearer), claimed by many an early Christian as an expression of his membership, as St. Ignatius on his trial spoke of himself as Θεοφορος. To this title was attached the beautiful allegory of the giant ever in search of the strongest master, whom he found at last in the little child that he bore on his shoulders over the river. Simplicity soon turned the parable into credited fact, and St. Christopher became the object of the most eager veneration, especially as there had been a real martyr so called, and mentioned in the Mozarabic service-book. He was put to death in Lycia, and his relics were supposed to have been at first at Toledo and afterwards at St. Denis. The sight of St. Christopher’s image was thought to be a protection from sickness, earthquake, fire, or flood, for the rest of the day, and it was therefore carved out and painted in huge proportions outside churches and houses, especially in Italy, Spain, and Germany. The cumbrous length is cut down in England into Kit, Kester, and Chris. The modern Greeks shorten Christophoros into Christachi. The two feminine are the German Christophine and English Christophera.
| English. | Scotch. | French. | Swedish. |
| Christopher | Christopher | Christophe | Kristofer |
| Kester | Christal | Kristofel | |
| Kit | |||
| Chris | |||
| Netherlands. | German. | Swiss. | Italian. |
| Toffel | Christoph | Chrestoffel | Cristoforo |
| Toff | Stoffel | Stoffel | Cristovano |
| Stoppel | Gristovalo | ||
| Portuguese. | Spanish. | Russian. | Polish. |
| Christovao | Cristoval | Christofer | Kristof |
| Christof | |||
| Lusatian. | Lett. | Lithuanian. | |
| Kitto | Kristoppis | Kristuppas | |
| Kristagis |
Christopher was once far more common in England than it is at present. In the list of voters at Durham in the year 1500, there were thirteen Christophers, and in 1813 there were as many as ten. The Germans have also Christophilon, meaning, loved by Christ.[[41]]
[41]. Milman, Christianity; Liddell and Scott; Jameson.
Section IV.—Sophia.
Perhaps we ought to consider Sophia (Σοφία) as one of the words most closely connected with divine attributes, since its use as a name was owing to the dedication of that most gorgeous of Christian temples by which Justinian declared that he had surpassed Solomon. It was called, and it has borne the title through its four hundred years of bondage to Islam, Sta. Sophia (the holy wisdom of God), that figurative wisdom whom Christians considered the Book of Proverbs to point out as the Word of God. Moreover, the words of the ‘Preacher,’ in the Book of Ecclesiasticus, “Wisdom (Σοφία) is the mother of fair Love and Hope and holy Fear,” suggested an allegory of a holy woman with three daughters so called, and thus, in compliment, no doubt, to the glorious newly-built church, the niece of Justinian’s empress, afterwards wife to his nephew and successor, was called Sophia, a name which thenceforward became the fashion among the purple-born daughters, and spread from them among the Slavonian nations, who regarded Constantinople as the centre of civilization.
Through these Slavonians Sophia spread to Germany. A Hungarian princess was so called in 999; another, the daughter of King Geysa, married Magnus of Saxony, in 1074, and Saxony scattered its Sophias in the next centuries all over the neighbouring states and into Denmark, where it has always been a royal name. Very nearly had the Electress Sophia brought it to our throne, and though the unhappy Sophia Dorothea of Zelle never took her place in the English Court, her grand-daughters made it one of the most fashionable ladies' names under the House of Hanover; and though its reign has passed with the taste for ornamental nomenclature, yet the soft and easy sound of Sophy still makes her hold her own.
| English. | French. | German. | Danish. | Frisian. |
| Sophia | Sophie | Sophia | Saffi | Vye |
| Sophy | Fieke | |||
| Italian. | Russian. | Polish. | Lett. | Hungarian. |
| Sofia | Ssofija | Zofia | Sappe | Zsofia |
| Ssonia | Zosia | Wike | Zsofe | |
| Ssoniuska |
Section V.—Petros.
Great is the controversy that hangs on the form of Πέτρος, the surname divinely bestowed upon the faithful disciple Simon Barjona, when he made his great confession of faith in the Godhead and Messiahship of his Master.
“Thou art Petros (a stone), and on this Petra (a rock) I will build my Church,” are the words.
The apostle was sometimes called in his own lifetime by the Hebrew or Syriac equivalent Κηφᾶς, or Cephas; but Petros, or Petrus, being both Greek and Latin words, he went down to posterity thus distinguished. Many a Pietro was called after him in Italy, to be cut down into Piero or Pier, and amplified into Pietruccio, or Petruccio and Petraccio. The devout Spaniards caught up the name, and had many a Pedro, nay, three Pedros at once were reigning at a time in three Peninsular kingdoms, and the frequency of Perez as a surname shows how full Spain is of the sons of Pedro. France had many a Pierre, Pierrot, or, in Brittany, Perronnik. Perrault, a common surname, may be a derivation from it, as is St. Pierre, one of the territorial designations. Before the Revolution, La Pierre and La France were the unvarying designations of the two lackeys that every family of any pretension always kept in those days of display.
England had Peter, which Peter-pence, perhaps, hindered from being a favourite, and borrowed from the French, Piers and Pierce. Feories is the Irish version of Pierce. Pedder or Peer are both much used in the North, and Peter in Germany; while the great Muscovite made Petr notable in his empire. The Irish, regardless of the true history of Patricius, want to make St. Patrick a namesake of St. Peter, and therefore the Paddys own not only their national apostle, but the prince of apostles, for their patrons. The feminines of Peter are Petronilla, said to have been his daughter, and whence has come Petronilla in Spanish, Petronille shortened into Nille in Norway, Pernel or Parnel, once exceeding common, though now forgotten, in England; but other female names have been made direct from that of the saint, Peronetta in Italy, Perretta in France, and even Petrina in Scotland and Sweden.
| English. | French. | Swedish. | Danish. | ||
| Peter | Pierre | Per | Peder | ||
| Piers | Pierrot | ||||
| Pierce | Perrin | ||||
| Peire | |||||
| Dutch. | Italian. | Spanish. | Portuguese. | ||
| Pieter | Pietro | Pedro | Pedro | ||
| Piet | Piero | Pedrinho | |||
| Pier | |||||
| Pietruccio | |||||
| Russian. | Polish. | Illyrian. | Lusatian. | ||
| Petr | Picti | Petai | Pjeti | ||
| Petruscha | Pies | Pero | Petsch | ||
| Petrinka | Petrica | Peto | |||
| Pejo | |||||
| Bulgarian. | Lett. | Esthonian. | Kelt. | ||
| Petur Petko | Peteris | Pedo Pet | Pétar Feoris | } | Erse |
| Per Petrik | } | Breton | |||
| FEMININE. | |||||
| English. | French. | Italian. | Portuguese. | ||
| Petrina | Perette | Petronilla | Petronilha | ||
| Petronella | Petronelle | German. | llyrian. | ||
| Pernel | Petrine | Petronille | Petra | ||
| Nelle | Petrija | ||||
| Nillel | Petrusa | ||||
Section VI.—Names of Immortality.
Rejoicing that “life and immortality had been brought to light” quickly broke out in the very names given to Christians at their baptism, and full of import were the appellations invented in these early ages of the Church, to express the joyful hope of everlasting life.
Even in the Sanscrit, a-mrita expresses the elixir of life, “the amreeta cup of immortality,” which terminates the woes of Kailyal in the Curse of Kehama, and according to Hindoo myth was produced by the celebrated churning of the ocean. The name is traced to a privative and mri, a word to be met with again in mors, murder, &c., and the notion of a water of life continued to pervade all the Indo-European races. Among the Greeks this life-giving elixir was ἀμβροσία (ambrosia), immediately derived from ἄμβροτος (immortal), a word from the same source. In various legends this ambrosia served to express the human craving for heavenly and immortal food, until at length, in later times, ambrosia came to be regarded as the substantial meat of the gods, as nectar was their drink.
It was reserved for Christianity to proclaim the true ambrosia, the veritable food of Paradise, and thus it was that Ambrosios became a chosen name, borne in especial by that great Archbishop of Milan, who spent one of the most illustrious lives recorded in Church history. The Church has never forgotten this great saint; and Milan, where his own liturgy has never been discontinued, is especially devoted to her Sant' Ambrogio, but his history is perhaps a little too much in the clear light of day to afford the convenient shadow requisite for name-spreading legend, and his name has but moderate popularity. Already, as we may suppose, his fame had spread to Britain when Aurelius Ambrosius, the brave champion who so long withstood the Saxon invaders, bore it and left it to the Welsh as Emrys.
| English. | French. | Italian. | Spanish. | Russian. |
| Ambrose | Ambroise | Ambrogio | Ambrosio | Amvrossij |
| Brush | ||||
| Polish. | Bohemian. | Lusatian. | Hungarian. | Welsh. |
| Ambrozij | Ambroz | ’Bros | Ambrus | Emrys |
| Mros | ||||
| Brosk | ||||
| Mrosk |
In the same spirit was formed Ἀθανασίος (Athanasios), from the word θάνατος (death). The Undying was in itself a name of good hope for a Christian, and it became dear to the Church at large through the great Alexandrian patriarch, the bulwark of the faith. It is in the East that his name has been kept up; the West, though of course knowing it and using it for him individually, shows few namesakes except in Italy, where it is probably a remnant of the Greek influence upon Venice and Naples. The feminine Atanasia is, I believe, solely Italian.
| French. | Italian. | Russian. | Servian. |
| Athanase | Atanasio | Afanassij | Atanacko |
| Atanagio |
So again the new Christians took the old word ἀνάστασις (meaning an awakening or raising), from ἀνίστημι (to make to stand up), and used it to signify the Resurrection; then formed from Ἀναστάσιος (Anastasios), of the Resurrection,—having the elements of the Resurrection within him or her, for the feminine Anastasia was as early and as frequent as the masculine. Indeed the strange caprices of fate have decreed that, though the masculine form is exceedingly common all over the Eastern Church, it should, in spite of three saints in the calendar, one of papal dignity, be almost unused in the West, except in Bavaria, whilst the feminine, borne by two virgin martyrs, is prevalent everywhere, and chiefly in Ireland. England once used the name more than at present, and then Anglicized it into Anstace. Anstiss, Anstish, Anstyce, all occur frequently as female names in the elder pages of a Devonshire parish register, where Anstice is now a surname. Anstis Squire is in the Froxfield register in 1587, and the name must once have been much more usual.
| French. | Italian. | Polish. | Bavarian. |
| Anastase | Anastagio | Anastazij | Anastasl |
| Stas | |||
| Stasl | |||
| Stasi | |||
| FEMININE. | |||
| English. | Irish. | French. | Russian. |
| Anastasia | Anastasia | Anastasie | Anastasia |
| Anstace | Anty | Nastassja | |
| Stacy | Nastenka | ||
Amongst these well-chosen baptismal titles may be mentioned Ζωή (Life), no doubt given as meaning that the principle of Eternal Life was then implanted. It is strange that neither the Eastern nor Western calendar shows a Zoë, though a woman thus entitled was said to have been cured of dumbness by a miracle of St. Sebastian, and afterwards to have been the first of the martyrs in the persecution in which he died, about the year 286. After this, Zoë became frequent among the women of the Greek Church, belonging to many of the royal ladies of the Blachernal, among others to her who endeavoured to shake the constancy of the sea-king, Harald Hardrada, to his Muscovite Elisif. From the lower empire it travelled to Russia, where Zoia is at present very common, and in the time of romantic interest in the new Greek kingdom, Zoé became fashionable in France, and still is much used there.[[42]]
[42]. Liddell and Scott; Southey, Notes to Curse of Kehama; Snorre, Sturleson, Heimskringla; Le Beau, Bas Empire.
Section VII.—Royal Names.
Σέβας (Sebas), awe or veneration, was compounded into the word Σεβαστός (Sebastos), as a translation for Augustus, the imperial title coined by Octavianus to express his own peculiar sacred majesty.
It was not, however, apparently used for the original Augustus; at least St. Luke calls him Αὔγουστος; and its technical use probably did not begin till the division of the empire by Diocletian, and his designation of two emperors as Augusti or Sebastoi, with their heirs as Cæsars.
Subsequently to this arrangement no one would have dared to assume the name so intimately connected with the jealous wearers of the purple; and, accordingly, it was a contemporary of the joint emperors, who is the martyr-saint of this name—Sebastianus, a soldier at Rome, who, when other Christians fled, remained there to encourage the flock in the first outburst of the last persecution. He endured a double martyrdom; first, by the well-known shower of arrows directed against him; and next, after his recovery under the care of a pious widow, who had carried away his supposed corpse to bury it, he defied the emperor again, and was beaten to death in the arena by clubs.
| English. | French. | Italian. | Spanish. |
| Sebastian | Sebastien | Sebastiano | Sebastian |
| Bastien | Bastiano | ||
| Basto | |||
| Portuguese. | German. | Norse. | Bavarian. |
| Sebastião | Sebastian | Sebastian | Bastian |
| Bastiao | Bastian | Baste | Basti |
| Swiss. | Russian. | Slavonic. | Hungarian |
| Bastia | Ssevastjan | Bostjan | Sebestyen |
| Bastiali | Bostej | ||
| Bascho | |||
| FEMININE. | |||
| German. | French. | Russian. | Bohemian. |
| Sebastiane | Sebastienne | Ssevastjana | Sebesta |
Devout women buried him in the catacombs, and his name slept for at least a hundred years till Pope Damasus built a church over his catacomb, which has ever since been called after him, and subsequent popes made presents of his relics to Tuscany, France, and other countries. A notion arose, Mrs. Jameson thinks, from his arrows reminding the classical world of the darts of Apollo, that he was connected with pestilence. His name is thus found all over Europe, though less commonly in England and the Protestant parts of Germany than farther south. Indeed its especial home is Portugal, where it must have been specially cherished in memory of the rash Don Sebastião, the last of the glorious House of Avis, for whose return from the fatal African campaign his country so long looked and longed.
More ancient was the term βασιλεύς (basileus), a king or prince, properly answering to the Latin rex, as did Sebastos to Augustus, but usually applied in the Greek-speaking countries to the emperor. Thence came many interesting words, such as the term used in the empire for courts of royal judgment, Basilica, whence upon their conversion into places of Christian worship, the title Basilicon became synonymous with church.
So, too, that royal-looking serpent who was supposed to wear a crown on his head, and to kill with a look, was the basilisk; and the familiar basilicon ointment was so termed as being fit for a king.
Βασίλειος (kingly) was not infrequent among the early Christians, and gained popularity through that great father of the Church, the Bishop of Neo-Cæsarea, as well as other more obscure saints. It is extremely common in the Eastern Church, and especially in Russia, where the first letter suffers the usual change into V. The feminine, Basilia, is still in use among the modern Greeks, and once even seems to have been known among English ladies, since the sister of Earl Strongbow is thus recorded in history, but its use has died away amongst us.
| English. | French. | Italian. | Russian. | Polish. |
| Basil | Basile | Basilio | Vassilij | Bazyli |
| Basine | Vasska | Illyrian. | ||
| Vassilij | ||||
| Vaso |
Section VIII.—Irene.
In heathen days Εἰρήνη (Eirene), peace, was personified and adored as a goddess; in Christian times, when peace on earth was preached, it was formed into a name—that which we know as Irene. Irene was the pious widow, whose care revived St. Sebastian after his first martyrdom, and in 303, three sisters, Agape (love), Irene, and Chionia underwent martyrdom at Thessalonica, but Irene seems to have absorbed almost all the subsequent honour, although Agapè is occasionally to be found in modern Greece, and formed the masculine surname Agapetus, once the property of a pope, and still used in Russia.
Irene was extremely frequent among the Greek empresses, and belonged to the lady who would fain have added herself to the list of Charlemagne’s many wives. Thence the Russians have it as Eereena, and in that ancient Greek colony at Sorrento, where the women’s features so strongly recall their Hellenic descent, Irene is continued as one of their baptismal names.
Thence was derived the name of the great father of the Church, Εἰρηναῖος (Eirenaios), Irenæus; but few of the fathers had popular names, and Irenæus has been little copied, except in Eastern Europe, where the Russians call it Irinej, and the Hungarians, Ernijó.
The Teuton fried and Slavonic mir have been infinitely more fruitful in names than the Greek Irene, and as to the Roman pax, its contributions to nomenclature are all posthumous.
Erasmus comes from ἰράω (íráo), to love, and is related to Eros. The first Erasmus was tortured to death in Diocletian’s persecution, at Formici, whence his relics were transferred to Gaeta, and he there became the patron of the Mediterranean sailors, who used to invoke him as St. Ermo or St. Elmo, at the approach of a storm, and he thus was thought to send the pale pure electric light that shimmers on the topmast, warning the sailor of the impending storm. The name of Erasmus was assumed by the learned Dutchman, under the belief that it translated his name of Gerhard (really spearhard), and from him Rasmus and Asmus are common in Holland, and Rasl has somehow found its way to Bavaria. Russia, too, has Jerassom, but this name lies in doubt between Erasmus and Gerasimus (the venerable), one of the early ascetics of Palestine.
Gelasius, the laugher, was the name of a pope, and for that reason was considered as appropriate and ecclesiastical. It has had the strange lot of being used in Ireland as the substitute for their native name of Giolla Iosa, or servant of Jesus, and was actually so used by the Primate reigning at the time of the English annexation of Ireland.[[43]]
[43]. Le Beau; Smith; Michaelis.
Section IX.—Gregorios.
Γρηγόριος (Gregorios), came from γρηγορέω, a late and corrupt form of the verb ἐγείρω (to wake or watch). A watchman was a highly appropriate term for a shepherd of the Church, and accordingly Gregorios was frequent among early bishops. Gregorios Nazianzen the friend of St. Basil, Gregorios Thaumaturgos or the wonder-worker, and others of the same high fame, contributed to render it highly popular in the East, and in the West it was borne by the great pope, for whose sake it became a favourite papal title, so that it has been borne by no less than sixteen occupants of the chair of St. Peter.
It has, however, been far less popular among those who own their sway than among the Eastern Christians who are free from it, and though we find it in Scandinavia, this is only as a modernization of the Norse Grjotgard, while the Macgregors of Scotland draw their descent not from Gregory, but from Grig or Gairig, a Keltic word meaning the fierce.[[44]]
| English. | French. | Italian. | Danish. |
| Gregory | Gregoire | Gregorio | Gregos |
| German. | Gregus | ||
| Gregor | Swedish. | ||
| Gregus | Greis | ||
| Gregoire | |||
| Russian. | Polish. | Bohemian. | Slavonic. |
| Grigorij | Grzegorz | Rehor | Gregor |
| Grischa | Grega | ||
| Gorej | |||
| Illyrian. | Lett. | Lithuanian. | Hungarian. |
| Gregorije | Grigg | Greszkus | Gergelj |
| Gerga | Grygallis | Gero |
[44]. Michaelis; Butler.
Section X.—Georgos.
The Maronite Christians have a tradition that Georgos was a Christian sentinel at Damascus, who connived at the escape of St. Paul, when he was let down in the basket, and was therefore put to death; but whether this be true or false, among what may be called the allegorical saints of the Greek Church, one of the most noted is our own patron Γῆ (Ge), earth, and ἔργω (ergo), anciently Γέργω (fergo), descended from the same source as our own verbs to work and to urge, formed Γεωργός (earthworker or husbandman). A Cappadocian saint and martyr, of whom nothing was known but that he had been a soldier and died in the last persecution, bore the name of Georgios, and was deeply reverenced in the East, where Constantine erected a church in his honour at Byzantium. As in the case of St. Christopher, and probably of St. Alexis, this honoured name became the nucleus of the allegory, of the warrior saint contending with the dragon, and delivering the oppressed Church, and of course the lovers of marvel turned the parable into substance. In 494, Pope Gelasius tried to separate the true Georgius from the legend, which he omitted from the offices of the Church, but popular fancy was too strong for the pope, and the story was carried on till the imaginations of the Crusaders before Jerusalem fixed upon St. George as the miraculous champion whom they beheld fighting in their cause, as Santiago had done for Galicia. Thereby Burgundy and Aquitaine adopted him as their patron saint; and the Burgundian Henry carried him to Portugal, and put that realm under his protection; as a hundred years later Richard I. did by England, making “St. George for merry England” the most renowned of battle-cries. From Burgundy he was taken by the Germans as a patron; and Venice, always connected with Greece, already glorified him as her patron, so that “In the name of St. George and St. Michael I dub thee knight,” was the formulary throughout half Europe, and no saint had so many chivalrous orders instituted in his honour.
Still the name was less early used in the West than might have been expected, perhaps from the difficulty of pronunciation. Georgios always prevailed in the East, and came to Scotland in the grand Hungarian importation, with the ancestor of the House of Drummond, who bear three wavy lines on their shield in memory of a great battle fought by the side of a river in Hungary, before the Atheling family were brought back to England, attended by this Hungarian noble. On the usurpation of Harold, he fled with them to Scotland, and there founded a family where the Eastern Christian name of George has always been an heir-loom. It was probably from the same Hungarian source that Germany first adopted Georg, or Jürgen, as it is differently spelt, and thence sent it to England with the House of Brunswick; for, in spite of George of Clarence, brother of Edward IV., and a few other exceptions, it had been an unusual name previously, and scarcely a single George appears in our parish registers before 1700, although afterwards it multiplied to such an extent as to make it doubtful whether George, John, or Charles be the most common designation of Englishmen.
The feminine is quite a modernism. The first English lady on record, so called, was a godchild of Anne of Denmark, who caused her to be christened Georgia Anna. The name had, however, previously existed on the Continent.
Venice took its Giorgio direct from Greece, but the name was not popular elsewhere in Italy; and at Cambrai, an isolated instance occurs in the year 1300, nor has it ever been common in France. The Welsh Urien (Uranius) descends from heaven to earth by considering George as his equivalent. The Irish translate the name into Keltic as Seoirgi.[[45]]
| English. | Scotch. | French. | Italian. |
| George | George | Georges | Giorgio |
| Georgy | Geordie | Georget | |
| Spanish. | Portuguese. | Wallachian. | Provençal |
| Jorge | Jorge | Georgie | Jortz |
| Jorgezinho | |||
| German. | Frisian. | Bavarian. | Swiss. |
| Georg | Jurgen | Görgel | Jörg |
| Jurgen | Jurn | Gergel | |
| Swedish. | Danish. | Dutch. | Russian. |
| Göran | Georg | Georgius | Gayeirgee |
| Jorgen | Joris | Georgij | |
| Jurriaan | Jurgi | ||
| Jurria | Egor | ||
| Egorka | |||
| Polish. | Bohemian. | Slavonic. | Illyrian. |
| Jerzy | Jiri | Jurg | Giuraj |
| Jurck | Giuro | ||
| Giuko | |||
| Djuradj | |||
| Djurica | |||
| Juro | |||
| Jurica | |||
| Lusatian. | Lett. | Lithuanian. | Esthonian. |
| Juro | Jorrgis | Jurgis | Jurn |
| Jurko | Jurrusch | Jurguttis | |
| FEMININE. | |||
| English. | French. | German. | Portuguese. |
| Georgiana | Georgine | Georgine | Georgeta |
| Georgina | Georgette | Illyrian. | |
| Gjurjija | |||
| Gjurgjinka | |||
[45]. Liddell and Scott; Jameson; Butler; Michaelis; O'Donovan.
Section XI.—Barbara.
Of the four great virgin saints, revered with almost passionate affection in the Roman Catholic Church, each has been made the representative of an idea. Probably Agnes, Barbara, Katharine, and Margaret were veritable maidens who perished in the early persecutions, and whose lives, save for some horrible incident in their tortures, were unknown; but around them crystallized the floating allegories of the Church, until Agnes became the representative of the triumph of innocence, Margaret of the victory through faith, Katharine of intellectual, and Barbara of artistic devotion. There was a speedy lapse from the allegory to the legend, just as of old, from the figure to the myth; and the virgins' popularity in all countries depended, not on their shadowy names in the calendar, but on the implicitly credited tales of wonder connected with them.
Barbara was said to be a maiden of Heliopolis, whose Christianity was revealed by her insisting that a bath-chamber should be built with three windows instead of two, in honour of the chief mystery of the Creed. Her cruel father beheaded her with his own hands, and was immediately destroyed by thunder and lightning. Here, of course, was symbolized the consecration of architecture and the fine arts to express religious ideas, and St. Barbara became the patroness of architects, and thence of engineers, and the protectress from thunder and its mimic, artillery. The powder room in a French ship is still known as la sainte Barbe. Her name has thus been widely spread, though chiefly among the daughters of artificers and soldiers, seldom rising to princely rank. Barbara is the feminine of βάρβαρος (a stranger), the term applied by the Greeks to all who did not speak their own tongue. Horne Tooke derives it from the root bar (strong), and thinks it a repetition of the savage people’s own reduplicated bar-bar (very strong); but it is far more probably an imitation of the incomprehensible speech of the strangers; as, in fact, the Greeks seem rather to have applied it first to the polished Asiatic, who would have given them less the idea of strength than the Scyth or the Goth, to whose language bar belonged in the sense of force or opposition. It is curious to observe how, in modern languages, the progeny of the Latin barbarus vary between the sense of wild cruelty and mere rude ignorance, or ill-adapted splendour.
| English. | Scotch. | French. | Italian. |
| Barbara | Babie | Barbe | Barbara |
| Bab | |||
| Barbary | |||
| Danish. | German. | Swiss. | Russian. |
| Barbraa | Barbara | Baba | Varvara |
| Barbeli | Babali | Varinka | |
| Barbechen | Babeli | ||
| Slavonic. | Illyrian. | Bohemian. | Lusatian. |
| Barbara | Barbara | Barbora | Baba |
| Barba | Varvara | Babuscha | |
| Barbica | Bara | ||
| Vara | |||
| Barica | |||
| Lett. | Lithuanian. | Hungarian. | |
| Barbule | Barbe | Borbola | |
| Barbe | Barbutte | Boris | |
| Babbe |
The true old English form is Barbary. It appears thus in all the unlatinized pedigrees and registers; and the peasantry still call it so, though unluckily it is generally turned into Barbara in writing.[[46]]
[46]. Jameson; Horne Tooke; Michaelis.
Section XII.—Agnes.
The word ἄγος (agos), a thing to which religious awe attaches, gave the adjective ἄγνος (agnos), sacred or pure, whence was named the tree whose twigs the Greek matrons strewed on their beds during the festival of Demeter, and which the Romans called by a reduplication of its title in both languages, the Agnus Castus. Agnus, the Latin for a lamb, is said to have come from the consecration of those creatures to sacred purposes; and thence, too, came Agnes, the name of the gentle Roman maiden, the place of whose martyrdom named the church of Sant' Agnese. It is said to have been built by Constantine the Great only a few years after her death, on the spot where she was put to the utmost proof; and it retains an old mosaic, representing her veiled only by her long hair, and driven along by two fierce soldiers.
Another very ancient church of Sant' Agnese covers the catacomb where she was interred, and she has always been a most popular saint both in the East and West, but most especially at her native city. There a legend became current, probably from her name, that as her parents and other Christians were weeping over her grave in the catacomb, she suddenly stood before them all radiant in glory, and beside her a lamb of spotless whiteness. She assured them of her perfect bliss, encouraged them, and bade them weep no more; and thus in all later representations of her, a lamb has always been her emblem, though it does not appear in the numerous very early figures of her that are still preserved.
A saint who was the object of so many legends could not fail of numerous votaries, and Agnes was common in England and Scotland, and was a royal name in France and Germany. The Welsh form is Nest. A Welsh Nest was the mother of Earl Robert of Gloucester. Iñes, as the Spaniards make it, indicating the liquid sound of the gn by the cedilla, gained a mournful fame in Portugal by the fate of Iñez de Castro, and Iñesila has been derived from it, while the former English taste for stately terminations to simple old names made the word Agneta. It is more common in Devonshire than in other counties. In Durham, there is a curious custom of calling any female of weak intellect, “a Silly Agnes.” Italy has invented the masculine Agnolo and Agnello, often confounded with Angelo, and used as its contraction.[[47]]
| English. | Welsh. | Manx. | French. |
| Agnes | Nest | Nessie | Agnes |
| Aggie | Agnies | ||
| Agneta | |||
| Italian. | Spanish. | Portugues | Swedish. |
| Agnese | Ines | Inez | Agnes |
| Agnete | Inesila | Agneta | |
| Agnesca | |||
| Danish. | Russian. | Polish. | Slavonic. |
| Agnes | Agnessa | Agnizka | Neza |
| Agnete | Agnessija | Bohemian. | Nezika |
| Anezka | |||
| Servian. | Lett. | Esthonian | Lithuanian. |
| Janja | Agnese | Neto | Agnyta |
| Lusatian. | Nese | ||
| Hanza | |||
[47]. Jameson; Brand, Popular Antiquities; Liddell and Scott; Michaelis.
Section XIII.—Margaret.
No name has been the occasion of more pretty fancies than Μαργαρίτης (a pearl), itself taken from the Persian term for the jewel, Murvarid (child of light), in accordance with the beauteous notion that the oysters rising to the surface of the water at night and opening their shells in adoration, received into their mouths drops of dew congealed by the moon-beams into the pure and exquisite gem, resembling in its pure pale lustre nothing so much as the moon herself, “la gran Margherita,” as Dante calls her. The thought of the pearl of great price, and of the pearl gates of the celestial city, no doubt inspired the Christian choice of Margarite for that child of light of the city of Antioch in Pisidia, whose name as virgin martyr standing in the Liturgy without any authentic history, became, before the fifth century, the recipient of the allegory of feminine innocence and faith overcoming the dragon, even as St. George embodied the victory of the Christian warrior. Greek though the legend were, as well as the name, neither flourished in the Eastern Church; but Cremona laid claim to the maiden’s relics, and Hungary in its first Christianity eagerly adopted her name, and reckons two saints so called in the eleventh century, besides having sent forth the sweet Margaret Ætheling, the wife of Malcolm Ceanmohr, the gentle royal saint of the Grace Cup, who has made hers the national Scottish female name. From Scotland it went to Norway with the daughter of Alexander III., whose bridal cost the life of Sir Patrick Spens; and it had nearly come back again from thence with her child, the Maid of Norway; but the Maid died on the voyage, and Margaret remained in Scandinavia to be the dreaded name of the Semiramis of the North, and was taken as the equivalent of Astrid and of Grjotgard. From Cremona Germany learnt to know the child-like Margarethe, one of the saints and names most frequently occurring there; and Provence, then an integral part of the Holy Roman Empire, likewise adopted her. From her was called the eldest of the four heiresses of Provence, who married St. Louis, leaving Marguérite to numerous French princesses. Her niece, the daughter of Henry III., was the first English Margaret; but the name was re-imported from France in the second wife of Edward I., and again in Margaret of Anjou, from whom was called Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII., and founder of the Lady Margaret professorship.
In her grand-daughter, Margaret Tudor, it ceased to be royal in England, though it had taken root among the northern part of the population, while, strangely enough, it hardly ever occurs among the southern peasantry. The Italian reverence for Margherita, or Malgherita, as they called her, was increased by the penitence of Margherita of Cortona, whose repentance became so famed that she was canonized. Many are the contractions of this favourite name, since it is too long for the popular mouth. The oldest is probably the Scottish Marjorie, as Bruce’s daughter was called, and which cut down into Maisie, the “proud Maisie” of the ballad, and later into Mysie, and was treated as a separate name. Mr. Lower tells us that the surname of Marjoribanks is derived from the barony of Raltio, granted to Marjorie Bruce on her marriage with the High Steward of Scotland. Margaret turned into Meg before the time of “Muckle-moued Meg of the Border,” and this as well as Maggie was shared with England, which likewise had Margery and Marget, as well as the more vulgar Peggy and Gritty, and likewise Madge.
The French contraction was in the sixteenth century Margot, according to the epitaph, self-composed, of the Austrian, Flemish, or French damsel, who was so nearly Queen of Spain:
“Ci gît Margot, la gentille demoiselle,
Qui a deux maris et encore est pucelle.”
But Gogo is not an improvement. Marcharit is the Breton form.
In Germany Grethel figures in various ‘Mahrchen,’ but Gretchen is now most common, and is rendered classical by Goethe. Mete in the time of Klopstock’s sway over the lovers of religious poetry was very fashionable; and Meta almost took up her abode in England, though the taste for simplicity has routed her of late.
Denmark, where the Semiramis of the North has domesticated the name, calls it Mette and Maret, and places it in many a popular tale and ballad as Metelill, or little Margaret.
Even the modern German Jews use it and call it Marialit; and the Vernacular Gaelic contraction used in Ireland is Vread, though Mairgreg is the proper form.[[48]]
| English. | Scotch. | French. | Italian. |
| Margaret | Margaret | Marguérite | Margherita |
| Margaretta | Marjorie | Margot | Malgherita |
| Margery | Maisie | Margoton | Ghita |
| Maggy | Maidie | Goton | Rita |
| Meggy | Maggie | Gogo | |
| Madge | Meg | ||
| Marget | May | ||
| Peggy | |||
| Gritty | |||
| Meta | |||
| Spanish. | German. | Swiss. | Danish. |
| Margarita | Margarethe | Margarete | Margarete |
| Portuguese. | Grete | Gretli | Mette |
| Margarida | Gretchen | Maret | |
| Grethe | Melletel | ||
| Grethel | |||
| Grel | |||
| Marghet | |||
| Mete | |||
| Polish. | Bohemian. | Slavonic. | Finland. |
| Margareta | Markota | Marjarita | Reta |
| Malgorzata | Marjeta | ||
| Malgosia | |||
| Lett. | Esthonian. | Lithuanian. | Hungarian. |
| Margrete | Maret | Magryta | Margarta |
| Greta | Kret | Gryta | Margit |
| Maije | Krot | Greta | |
| Madsche |
[48]. Reeves, Conchology; Liddell and Scott; Butler; Michaelis; Grimm; Weber, Northern Romance.
Section XIV.—Katharine.
The maiden martyr, whose name was chosen as the centre of the allegory of intellectual religion, was Καθαρινή (Kathariné), Catharina in Latin, from a virgin martyr of Alexandria, whose history being unknown, became another recipient of a half-allegorical legend. It is not found recorded earlier than the eighth century, and, indeed, the complete ignorance of the state of the Roman empire, shown by making her the daughter of a king of Egypt, argues its development at a very late period. Her exceeding wisdom, her heavenly espousals, her rejection of the suit of Maximus, the destruction of the wheels that were to have torn her in pieces, her martyrdom by the sword, and the translation of her body by angels to Mount Sinai, are all familiar through the numerous artistic works that have celebrated her. The legend is thought to have grown up to its full height among the monks of the convent that bears her name at the foot of Mount Sinai. And the many pilgrims thither had the zest of a new and miraculous legend, such as seems always to have been more popular than the awful truth beside which it grew up; but it never obtained credit enough in the East to make Katharina come into use as a name in the Greek Church, and it was only when the Crusaders brought home the story that it spread in ballad and mystery throughout the West. Indeed, the name did not prevail till it had been borne by the Italian devotee, Santa Caterina of Sienna, who tried to imagine the original Katharina’s history renewed in herself, and whose influence is one of the marvels of the middle ages. Before this, however, the fair Katharine, Countess of Salisbury, had been the heroine of the Garter, and John of Gaunt had named the daughter, who, as Queen of Castille, made Catalina a Spanish name, whence it returned to us again with Katharine of Aragon; but in the mean time Catherine de Valois, the Queen of Henry V., had brought it again from France.
The cause of the various ways of spelling this word would appear to be that the more ancient English made no use of the letter K, which only came in with printing and the types imported from Germany. Miss Catherine Fanshaw wrote a playful poem in defence of the commencement with C, avouching K to be no Saxon letter, and referring to the shrewish Katharina and the Russian empress as examples of the bad repute of the K; but her argument breaks down, since the faithful Spanish Catalina, as English queen, wrote herself Katharine, while the ‘Shrew’ in Italy could only have been Caterina, and the Russian empress is on her coins Ekaterina. On the whole, Katherine would seem properly to be a namesake of the Alexandrian princess, Catherine, the Votaress of Sienna. No name is more universal in all countries and in all ranks, partly from its own beauty of sound, partly from association, and none has more varied contractions. Our truest old English ones are Kate and Kitty—the latter was almost universal in the last century, though now supplanted by the Scottish Katie and the graceful Irish Kathleen.
Catherine has even produced a masculine name. Perhaps Anne and Mary are the only others which have been thus honoured; but the sole instance is Caterino or Catherin Davila, the historian, who had the misfortune to have Catherine de Medici for his godmother.
| English. | Scotch. | Irish. | Welsh. |
| Katharine | Catharine | Kathleen | Cathwg |
| Catherine | Katie | Katty | |
| Catharina | Dutch. | Bret. | |
| Kate | Kaat | Katel | |
| Kitty | Kaatje | Katelik | |
| Katrine | |||
| French. | Portuguese. | Spanish. | Italian. |
| Cathérine | Catharine | Catalina | Caterina |
| Catant | |||
| Caton | |||
| Gaton | |||
| Trinette | |||
| Cataut | |||
| Swedish. | Danish. | German. | Dantzic. |
| Katarina | Kathrina | Katharine | Trien |
| Kajsa | Karina | Kathchen | Kasche |
| Kolina | Karen | Kathe | |
| Kasen | Thrine | ||
| Bavarian. | Swiss. | Russian. | Polish. |
| Katrine | Kathri | Ekaterina | Katarnyna |
| Kadreinl | Kathrili | Katinka | Kasia |
| Treinel | Tri | Katinsha | |
| Kadl | Trili | Katja | |
| Kattel | Trine | ||
| Ketterle | Hati | ||
| Hatili | |||
| Slovak. | Illyrian. | Esthonian. | Hungarian. |
| Katrina | Katarina | Katri | Katalin |
| Katra | Katica | Kaddo | Kati |
| Katrej | Kats | Katicza | |
Section XV.—Harvest Names.
From θέρω (to heat) was derived θέρος (summer), which, in sunny Greece, came likewise to mean the summer crop, just as in Germany Herbst serves for both autumn and harvest. θερίζω (to reap or gather in the crop), and from this verb comes the pretty feminine Theresa, the reaper. “The first to bear the predestined name of Theresa,” as Montalembert says, was a Spanish lady, the wife of a Roman noble called Paulinus, both devotees under the guidance of St. Jerome, whose writings most remarkably stamped the memory of his friends upon posterity; and this original Theresa was copied again and again by her own countrywomen, till we find Teresa on the throne of Leon in the tenth century. The name was confined to the Peninsula until the sixteenth century, when that remarkable woman, Saint Teresa, made the Roman Catholic Church resound with the fame of her enthusiastic devotion. The Spanish connection of the House of Austria rendered it a favourite with the princesses both of Spain and Germany. The Queen of Louis XIV. promoted it in France as Thérèse, and it is specially common in Provence as Térézon, for short, Zon. The empress-queen greatly added to its fame; and it is known everywhere, though more in Roman Catholic countries and families than elsewhere. That it nowhere occurs in older English pedigrees is one of the signs that it was the property of a saint whose claims to reverence began after the Reformation.
| English. | French. | Portuguese. | Spanish. |
| Theresa | Thérèse | Theresa | Teresa |
| Terry | Térézon | Teresita | |
| Tracy | Zon | ||
| Italian. | German. | Hamburg. | Bavaria. |
| Teresa | Theresia | Tresa | Res’l |
| Teresina | Trescha | ||
| Bohemian. | Slavonic. | Illyrian. | Hungarian. |
| Terezie | Terezija | Tereza | Terezia |
| Terza | Threzsi |
The real popularity of the word, witnessed by its many changes of sound, is, be it observed, in those Eastern domains of the empress where her noble spirit won all hearts to the well-remembered cry “Moriamur pro Rege nostrâ Maria Theresa.”
Eustaches has already been explained as one of these harvest names. And to these may be added that of the old Cypriot shepherd hermit Σπυρίδων (Spiridōn), from σπυρίς (a round basket). He was afterwards a bishop, and one of the fathers of Nicea, then going home, died at a great age, asleep in his corn field; in honour of whom Spiridione, or Spiro, as the Italianized Greeks call it, is one of the most popular of all names in the Ionian Islands, and has the feminine Spira.[[49]]
[49]. Liddell and Scott; Montalembert; Surius; Anderson, Genealogies.
Section XVI.—Names from Jewels.
Margaret, which has been spoken of elsewhere, is the most noted of jewel names, and it probably suggested the few others that have prevailed.
Σμάραγδος (Smaragdos) is supposed to have been named from μαίρω or μαρμαίρω (to twinkle or sparkle), whence the dog-star was called Μαῖρα (Maira). This beauteous precious stone, bearing the colour of hope, was further recommended to Christians because the rainbow of St. John’s vision was “in sight like unto an emerald.” Thus, Smaragdos was one of the early martyrs; and the same occurs occasionally in early times, once as an exarch of Ravenna; but it was never frequent enough to be a recognized name, except in two very remote quarters, namely, as the Spanish Esmeralda and the Cornish Meraud, the last nearly, if not quite, extinct.
The Sapphire was erased for ever from the nomenclature of Christians by the fate of the unhappy Sapphira, except that Σαπφήρω (Sapphēro), a name thus derived, is used among the modern Greeks of the Ionian Islands; and so also is Διαμάντω (Diamanto).
For want of a better place, the Italian name Gemma must here be mentioned, though purely Latin, and coming from a word meaning the young crimson bud of a tree, though since used for a gem or jewel. In Erse Gemlorg, gem-like, is almost exactly the same in sound and spirit.
Moreover, both precious metals are used as female names in modern Greece, Ἀργύρω (Argyro), silver, connecting itself with the Arianwen, or silver lady, of Wales; and Χρυσωῦχα (Chrysoucha) from Χρυσός (Chrysós), gold. This latter word has formed many other names, beginning from Chryses and his daughter Chryseis, whose ransom was the original cause of “Achilles' wrath of mighty woes the spring.” In the soubriquet of Chrysostomos, or Golden Mouth, we have already seen it, and it is found also in Χρύσανθος (Chrysanthos), golden flower, the husband of Saint Daria, in whose honour prevails the Bavarian Chrysanth or Santerl.
Muriel, an old English name, comes from μύρον (myrrh). Both it and Meriel were once common, and have lately been revived.[[50]]
[50]. Smith, Life of Chaucer; Butler; Michaelis.
Section XVII.—Kosmos and Damianos.
The pursuit of the relics of saints had already begun even in the fourth century. No church was thought thoroughly consecrated save by the bones of some sainted Christian, and it was during the first fervour that led men to seek the bodies of the martyrs in their hiding-places, that St. Ambrose discovered the bodies of two persons at Milan, whom a dream pronounced to be Kosmos and Damianos, two martyred Christians.
They, of course, were placed among the patrons of Milan, and their names became favourites in Italy. Kosmos originally meant order; but, having been applied to the order of nature, has in our day come usually to mean the universe.
Cosimo, or Cosmo, as the Italians called it, was used at Milan and Florence, where it gained renown in the person of the great man who made the family of Medici eminent, and who prepared the way for their aspirations to the elevation that proved their bane and corruption. France calls the word Côme without using it as a name, and Russia adopts it as Kauzma.
Damianos was from the verb δαμάω, identical with our own tame, which we have already seen in composition. He had a good many chivalrous namesakes, as Damiano, Damiao, Damien, and the Russians call him Demjan. The old Welsh Dyfan is another form strangely changed by pronunciation.
Section XVIII.—Alethea, &c.
Ἀλήθεια (Aletheia), truth, came from α and λήθω (to hide), and thus means openness and sincerity.
When it first came to be used as a name is not clear. Aletha, of Padua, appears in 1411; and the princess, on whose account Charles I., when Prince of Wales, made his journey to Spain, was Doña Maria Aletea. About that time Alethea made her appearance in the noble family of Saville, and either to a real or imaginary Alethea were addressed the famous lines of the captive cavalier:—
“Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage.”
Moreover, in 1669, Alethea Brandling, at the age of nine, was married to one Henry Hitch, esq., and the name occurs several times in Durham pedigrees.
As far as the English Alethea is concerned, she is probably the alteration of an Irish name, for she chiefly belongs to the other island, and is there called Letty. What feminine it was meant to translate must be uncertain, perhaps Tuathflaith (the noble lady). Tom Moore called his Egyptian heroine Atethe, from the adjective, and this has been in consequence sometimes used as a name.
The name Althea must not be confounded with it. This last is Ἄλθεια (wholesome). It belonged of old to the unfortunate mother of Meleager, and now designates a genus of mallows, in allusion to their healing power.
We find the prefix πρό, forming part of the word προκοπή (progress), whence the name Προκόπιος (Prokopios); in Latin, Procopius, progressive. It was the name of a martyr under Diocletian, in Palestine, and is a favourite in the Greek Church. The short-lived successor of Jovian was so called; also the great Byzantine historian; and now Prokopij is very common among the Russian clergy; and Prokop or Prokupek has found its way into Bohemia. Russia, likewise, uses in the form of Prokhor, the name of Próchorus (Πρόχορας), one of the seven deacons, and much Græcized indeed must the imaginations of his Jewish parents have been when they gave him such an appellation, signifying the leader of the choral dances in the Greek theatres.