CHAPTER V

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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 │ Portuguese. │ │ │ │ Spanish. │ │ │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 │ │Tewdwr │Théodore │Theodoro │ and Italian. │ │ ——————— │ │ │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 │ │ │ │ └───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┘

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Footnote 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 │ —————— │Tziasso │ │ │Krischân │ Dutch. │Zasso │ │ │Kruschan │Korstiaan │Sasze │ ├───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┤ │ Swiss. │ Polish. │ Slavonic. │ Illyrian. │ │Krista │Krystyan │Kristijan │Kristian │ │Chresta │ │ │Kersto │ │Chresteli │ │ │Hristo │ ├───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┤ │ Lusatian. │ Bulgarian. │ Lett. │ Esthonian. │ │Khrystjan │Krustjo │Kristo │Kersti │ │Kristo │ │Skersto │ —————— │ │Kito │ │ │ Hungarian. │ │ │ │ │Kerestel │ ├───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┤ │ FEMININE. │ ├───────────────┬───────────────┬───────────────┬───────────────┤ │ English. │ French. │ German. │ Bulgarian. │ │Christiana │Christine │Christiane │Khrustina │ │Christian │ │Christine │ —————— │ │Christina │ │Stine │ Lithuanian. │ │Chrissie │ │Tine │Krikszte │ │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]

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Footnote 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 │Peteris │Pedo │Pétar } _Erse_ │ │Petko │ │Pet │Feoris } │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │Per } _Breton_│ │ │ │ │Petrik } │ ├───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┴─────────────────┤ │ FEMININE. │ ├───────────────┬───────────────┬───────────────┬─────────────────┤ │ English. │ French. │ Italian. │ Portuguese. │ │Petrina │Perette │Petronilla │Petronilha │ │Petronella │Petronelle │ ———————————— │ ———————————— │ │Pernel │Petrine │ German. │ llyrian. │ │ │ │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]

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Footnote 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]

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Footnote 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 │ │ │ —————————— │ │Gregus │ │ │ German. │ │ —————————— │ │ │Gregor │ │ Swedish. │ │ │Gregus │ │Greis │ ├───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┤ │ Russian. │ Polish. │ Bohemian. │ Slavonic. │ │Grigorij │Grzegorz │Rehor │Gregor │ │Grischa │ │ │Grega │ │ │ │ │Gorej │ ├───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┤ │ Illyrian. │ Lett. │ Lithuanian. │ Hungarian. │ │Gregorije │Grigg │Greszkus │Gergelj │ │Gerga │ │Grygallis │Gero │ └───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┘

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Footnote 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 │ └───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┘

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Footnote 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]

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Footnote 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 │ ————————— │Nezika │ │ │ │ Bohemian. │ │ │ │ │Anezka │ │ ├───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┤ │ Servian. │ Lett. │ Esthonian │ Lithuanian. │ │Janja │Agnese │Neto │Agnyta │ │ ————————— │Nese │ │ │ │ Lusatian. │ │ │ │ │Hanza │ │ │ │ └───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┘

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Footnote 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 │ │ ————————— │Grete │Gretli │Mette │ │ Portuguese. │Gretchen │ │Maret │ │Margarida │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 │ │ │ │ └───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────┘

Footnote 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 │ —————————— │ │ —————————— │ │Kate │ Dutch. │ │ Bret. │ │Kitty │Kaat │ │Katel │ │Katrine │Kaatje │ │Katelik │ ├───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────┤ │ 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]

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Footnote 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]

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Footnote 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.

## PART IV.

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