| English. | Irish. | French. | Italian. |
| Walter | Thaiter | Waltier | Gualtiero |
| Water | Gualtier | Spanish. | |
| Wat | Wautier | Guttierre | |
| Watty | Gatier | ||
| Wattles | Gautier | ||
| Portuguese. | Netherlands. | Lettish. | Dutch. |
| Gualter | Gualterus | Waters | Wolder |
| Gualterio | Walter | Swiss. | |
| Wouter | Watli |
Waldemar is an old German form imported by the Normans to England, and sometimes supposed to have been carried to Russia, and to have turned into Vladimir; but this has been traced to a genuine Slavonic source, though it is used by the Russians to represent Walter.
This commencement is almost exclusively German; its other varieties are Waldobert, or Walbert, the Gualberto of Italy, Waldrich, and, perhaps, Walpurg, though she is more probably from val, slaughter.
Frodhr, Wise or learned, is sometimes an epithet, but is also used for a name, and Latinized into Frotho. The Germans have it in combination as Frodwin, wise friend, Frodbert and Frodberta, whence the French make Flobert and Floberte.
The root mah, which made the Sanscrit mahat, Zend maz, Greek megas, Latin magnus, Kelt mawr, comes forth again in Teutonic, with mære, or mara, in Anglo-Saxon, with its comparatives mœrre and mœriste, whence our more and most. This same sense of greatness formed the word maara, fame, and maren, to celebrate, both old German, and it is the commencement of the Frank chieftain’s name from whom all the princes of the earlier race were called Meerwings, Merowig, or Famed men, the Meerwig of German writers and Meroveus of Latinity, whence the Merovée of French history.
Our own Anglian Mercians had among their royal line Merowald, Merehelm, and Merewine; but, in general, mer, or mar, is used as a termination rather than a commencement, and then is always masculine. Merohelm is also called Merchelm, so the French saint, ‘Marculphe,’ may have been Merowulf, though he now looks more like Markulf, a border wolf.[wolf.][[148]]
[148]. Munch; Sismondi; Butler; Junius; Kemble; Michaelis; Lappenburg; Mariana; Weber and Jamieson; Donovan.
Section VII.—Affection.
The Teutons had a few names denoting affection. Dyre is the same in Norse as our own word dear, or dyr in Anglo-Saxon. An inlet on the north-west corner of Iceland is still termed Dyrefiord, from one of the first settlers, and Dyre was the hero of a ballad in the Kæmpeviser, answering to the Scottish Katharine Janfarie, the original of young Lochinvar. The old Germans had Dioro and Diura, and the Anglo-Saxons affectionately called the young sons of their nobility Dyrling, or darling.