Re: Anglo-Saxon Naming Traditions


celia wrote:

I just wanted to mention a concept I got introduced to via social
anthropology. A family might be thought to consist not only of those members
living, but can be seen as a group of people living, dying and being reborn
through time. Relating to this, names for infants would rather be chosen
from the ranks of the dead family members (stressing continuity). So the
choice of name could indicate a bloodline connection between its bearers
through time.

That concept would explain the common naming pattern
in English AS names of children being named after grandparents.


Yes, I think this probably is a very useful concept. Certainly my
(relatively limited) reading of prosopographical studies would seem to
indicate that it is often this concept that allows the reconstruction
of family relationships in the absence of definite confirmation (so the
various Berengers and Poppo/Poppa discussed by Keats-Rohan and
Settipani, IIRC). If so then, if there was such a system of 'classed'
names as speculated here, then it would perhaps result in the
maintenance and perpetuation of such a system.

Cheers,

Tom Green
Exeter College,
Oxford

Arthurian Resources -- http://www.arthuriana.co.uk

.

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