History of Christian names

by Charlotte M. Yonge

The primary personages of semi-divine rank in these traditions are Hu Gadarn, or the Mighty, the sun god, and his wife Ceridwen. It is believed that the two sacred islands of Iona and Mona were both originally Ynysgwaw Hu, the island of the worship of Hu. Others, however, say, that Iona was only I-thon, or isle of the waves.

The word Hu is not explained; but it has passed into a name in Wales and Brittany. Old French has the name inflected as Hue, Hues, Huon, and the feminine Huette; and the true Anglicized Welsh form is Hu or Hew, though it is now universally confounded with the Teutonic Hugh, from hugur, thought, with which it may be cognate, and the Welsh patronymic Ap Hu is always spelt Pugh.

The Triads speak of Aed Mawr, or Aedd, as father of Pridain, but he may have been either a title of Hu, or else the god himself. Aodh is, in fact, in sound and sense, closely related to the Greek αίθω (aitho), and our heat is of the same kin.

Dr. Meyer thinks this Aed Mawr of the Triads was the forefather from whom the Ædui mentioned by Cæsar were called, and further derives from him Cæer Aeddon, or Dun Aeddon, Dun Edin, or Edinburgh. Yet, on the other hand, it is a part of our English faith that Auld Reekie is our Northumbrian Edwin’s burgh.

Aed, Aeddon, Aodh, Aedhan, were far more popular names than those derived from Hu. Aeddan is lamented by Aneurin as a British warrior slain among the victims of Henghist’s treachery; and two Aoidhs reigned, the one in Connaught, the other in Scotland, in 570; and to the latter of these, called by Scottish historians Aidan, or Edan, they ascribe the foundation of their capital; but it was at that time in the possession of the Angles, and if called after any Aodh, it must have been after an earlier one. The Irish Aodh is said to have been about to expel the bards, but to have been prevented by the intercession of St. Columb.

At one time Ireland was afflicted with thirteen contemporary Aodhs; and at least two so called reigned in Scotland—Aodhfin, or the white, the Ethfine of historians, and Aoidh, or Eth, the swift-footed. So common was the name among the Irish that one hundred Aodhs and one hundred Aidans or Oédans were killed in the battle of Maghrath. The MacAodhas of Ireland were once many in number; and became MacHugh or Magee; in Scotland, Mackay; or were sometimes translated into Hughson or Hewson. But the most interesting person so called is known to us as Aidan. He visited Wales and Scotland, became a monk of Iona, and then went forth as a missionary to the North of England. He was the friend of the admirable Oswald, free of hand, king of Deira, who used to interpret[interpret] his Keltic speech to the Angle population; and his gentle teaching won to the Church multitudes whom the harshness of former missionaries had repelled. He is reckoned as first bishop of Lindisfarn, and has left his name to sundry churches of St. Aidan. Aoidhne, or Eithne, was the Irish feminine once distinguished, but now disused.

Aidan is still a female name among some Welsh families.

Another Irish St. Aeddan, who was bishop of Ferns about the year 632, has a most curious variety of namesakes—some from his baptismal name, others from his pet appellation Móedóg, that is M'Óedóg, namely Ma Otdóg, my little Aodh. This strange custom of prefixing the possessive pronoun, first person singular, to the proper name of a saint was very general. Maodhòg, as it has since become, is still common in Wexford, where the Irish language has disappeared. It is pronounced and written Mogne, and is perpetuated in honour of the Saint of Ferns. Madog, or Madawc, was the usual form in Wales, where it has always been in great favour. Madawc, prince of Powysland, who died in 1158, in great favour with Henry II. The Latin translation of Aidan, Aideus, or Aidanus, has adhered to him in Basse Bretagne, but has there been cut down into Dé, St. Dé being the appellation of a village there, the church of which is dedicated to Mogne, is by Irish Protestants often Anglicized as Aidan, by the Roman Catholics as Moses.

The leek is said to have been used by the Welsh in the worship of Ceridwen, the wife of Hu. Afterwards a story rose that, in one of Cadwallawn’s battles, his Welshmen marked themselves with leeks from a garden hard by, and the story was later transferred to the Welsh troops of the Black Prince in France.

Ced, or Cyridwen, shows no namesakes; but buadh, or budd, victory, furnished for her the epithet of Buddug, or Buddud; and, perhaps, she is the Boundonica mentioned by Dion Cassius as a Keltic goddess. Probably it was either as a victorious omen, or else in honour of her, that the name of Buddug was given to that fierce chieftainess of the Iceni, whose savage vengeance for her wrongs has won for her a very disproportionate fame, as much changed as her name, when we call it Bonduca, or, more usually, Boadicea. It has not met with much repetition, yet we have heard of a family so patriotic as to contain both Caractacus and Boadicea. Buadhach was, however, long a man’s name in Ireland, and Budhic was one of the early Armorican princes.