HOPE THIS MAY BE OF HELP OR INTEREST - REGARDING THE ORIGINS OF NAMES
When the Saxon invaders arrived in England in the fifth and sixth centuries – to rape, pillage, and ultimately conquer - they brought with them their own language. Although they did not kill all the native Britons, the Saxons did almost destroy their language, and replaced the native Celtic with their own ‘Germanic’ tongue (this much later became known as ‘Old English’ (O.E.), to differentiate from the later, post-Norman tongue that evolved into the ‘Modern English’ used today).
The Saxons called the native Britons wealas (which meant ‘foreigner’ or ‘slave’). It is from this word we get the Modern English words ‘Welsh’ and ‘Wales’, for that country became the last real enclave of the oppressed native Celts, who, once contained there, were regarded as ‘foreigners’ by the Saxon settlers (The Celts also survived in other areas too, but here is not the place to discuss it).
It was not just the renaming of the natives that was imposed; the whole language of England changed (even the name ‘England’ comes from the Germanic language and means 'Land of the Angles’… or, more obviously, ‘Angle Land’. The Angles were another Germanic people who simultaneously invaded in the same era… hence the term ‘Anglo-Saxon’ used to describe the non-Celtic white people [such as this writer] who eventually predominated England and later migrated to many parts of the world).
Of the hundred or so ‘key’ words that make up about half of our everyday speech today, most are Old English. Some have not changed in their spelling, such as and, for, of, in, to, under, on. Others have changed their spelling a little, as in æfter (after), beforan (before), behindan (behind), bi (by), eall (all), hwæt (what), hwy (why), ofer (over), uppan (up), æt (at), æg (egg), socc (sock), scoh (shoe), scyrte (shirt), hætt (hat), mete (meat), butere (butter), milc (milk), hunig (honey), and cese (cheese). All our words for the close family come from Old English, i.e. faeder, moder, sunu, dohtor, sweoster, brothor, as do many of our famous 4-letter English swear words!
The names of the days of the week are also Anglo-Saxon in origin: Monandæg (the day of the moon), Tiwesdæg (the day of the god Tiw or Tig), Wodnesdæg (the day of the god Woden), Ðunresdæg (the day of the god Ðunor or Thunor), Frigedæg (the day of the goddess Friga), Sæternesdæg (the day of the Roman god Saturn), Sunnandæg (the day of the sun). Several of our modern festivals have an Old English name, for example Easter gets its name from the pagan Saxon goddess Eostre, whose festival was in April, and Yule, from the pagan midwinter celebration of Geol (pronounced 'yule').
Below is a verse from post-pagan Saxon times; at first glance it looks difficult to understand:
Thu ure fæther, the eart on heofonum, sy thin nama gehalgod.
Cume thin rice, Sy thin wylla on eorthan swaswa on heofonum.
Syle us todæg urne daeghwamlican hlaf.
And forgyf us ure gyltas swaswa we forgyfath thampe with us agyltath.
And ne lae thu na us on costnunge, ac alys us fram yfele
However, when it is spelt phonetically it becomes instantly recognisable to any modern person as the forerunner of the Lord’s Prayer:
Thu our father, thee art on heavenum, say thine nama holyod.
Come thine rich, say thine will on earth swas-wa on heavenum.
Sell us today ourne day-wham-lick hloaf.
And forgive us our guiltas swas-wa we forgiv-ath themp with us a-guilt-ath.
And no lee thu us on costnun-ya, ash all-lees us from evil.
The Saxon invaders did not destroy the Celtic settlements they conquered, but, finding most of the names difficult to pronounce renamed many (but not all) in their own language. Many new settlements were founded too, and these of course were given Saxon names from the start. Many hundreds of these survive to the present day.
The commonest Saxon place names are those ending in -ton or -ham. These two words are derived from the O.E. words Tun; meaning fenced area or enclosure, and Ham, meaning village, estate or home (or sometimes the O.E. word Hamm, meaning meadow). Often these were joined with the name of the person who founded the settlement, or an important person who lived there, such as Ceatta's Ham (modern day Chatham) – ‘the home of Ceatta’. Other times the name described some feature of the area, such as Brom Tun (Brompton) -'the enclosure where broom grew'. Some of the other more common ones are - wick or - wich from O.E. wic, meaning dwelling or village, e.g. Sandwich - 'The village on sandy soil'; -bridge from the O.E. brycg meaning bridge, e.g. Tonbridge - 'Tunna's bridge'; -ford the O.E. for a river ford, e.g. Aylesford - 'the Angles ford'. The word -stow cones from the O.E. for an inhabited place, e.g. Halstow - 'holy place', or Felixstowe – the place of Felics (or Felic’s place). The suffixes -burton or -bury come from the O.E. burh meaning fort, e.g. Canterbury - 'the fort of the Kentish people'. The name Sutton derives from the O.E. Suth Tun meaning southern enclosure, e.g. Sutton Valence (the ‘Valence’ part is a post Norman Conquest addition to the name – the French is easily detectable!). These are just a small selection of the many more place names that exist.
Although much of our modern language comes from the language of the Anglo-Saxons and Vikings, very few Christian names do. There are a few, such as Alfred, Agatha, Agnes, Cuthbert, Edgar, Edmund, Edward, Edith, Edwin, Godfrey, Harold, Hilda and Matilda from the Anglo-Saxons and a few, such as Erik, Freda, Harald, Helga, Jon, Karl and Neil from the Vikings, but most Anglo-Saxon and Viking names sound very strange to modern ears; names such as Æthelberht, Offa, Wulfstan, Godwin, Beorhtweard, Cyneric, Leofwine, Ælfgifu, Ealswith, Wulfwyn, Arnbjorn, Guthrum, Halfdan, Grimketil, Snorri, Arnbjorg, Gerd and Gudrun. However, when you look at Surnames, there is much more evidence of our Saxon and Viking past. My mother’s maiden name is Jarrold, a Saxon name [derived from Goerwald] meaning ‘Spear Might’, and the Jarrold family tree is firmly planted in the towns and villages of Suffolk that still bear Saxon names [Tattingstone, Saxmundham, and Ipswich].
Although the Anglo-Saxons did not have surnames in the same way that we do today, they distinguished between two people with the same name by adding to their first name either the place they came from or the job they performed. For example, a woman named Edith who lived in the town of Blackburn would be known as Edith of Blackburn, or just Edith Blackburn: a man named Edward who was a blacksmith would be known as Edward the Smith, or just Edward Smith. Many of our modern surnames are actually 'occupational names' - Bowyer, Baxter, Baker, Weaver, Fisher, Fowler, Hunter, Farmer, etc. My paternal surname, Foreman, comes from the O.E. word for ‘Swineherd’ – the prefix ‘Fore’ being the Old English for ‘Pig’ or ‘Swine’, and therefore the Foreman was ‘the man in charge of the pigs’. The modern connotation is probably not lost on the proletariat workforce!
