Sara L Uckelman on Mon, 7 Mar 2005 22:09:27 -0600 (CST)


[Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Date Index] [Thread Index]

[HS] Lesson 2: Late-period French feminine names


One of my recent research projects has been going through a
three-volume set of records of tax records from late-period
northern France. [1,2]  The three volumes cover:

Volume 1: Paris; Senlis; Clermont-en-Beauvaisis; and Valois
Volume 2: Amboise & Blois; Chartres, Dreux, & Châteauneuf-en-
Thymerais; Clermont-en-Beauvaisis; Ã?tampes & Dourdan; Mantes & 
Meulan; Melun; Montargis; Montfort-L'Amaury, Nemours & Château-
Landon; Orléans; Paris; Senlis; and Valois.
Volume 3: Berry; Bourbonnais; Champagne & Brie; Normandie; Picardie, 
Vermandois, & Ponthieu; Sens; and Touraine.

This map from 1453 shows where these regions and cities are:
http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/historical/shepherd/france_1453_shepherd.jpg

The records are from the late 14th century to the early 17th, with
most of them falling in the 616th century.  The sources contain 
hundreds of names.  I focused on the feminine names because too many 
of the men were mentioned more than once, making it difficult to do 
any sort of statistical compilations.  Also, feminine names are in 
general harder to find examples of than masculine names, so I figured 
there'd be more of a draw for the feminine names.

The source has the depressing "feature" in that it modernized all of
the given names (I'll say a bit more later on  how I was able to tell
this despite not being able to read French and hence not being able
to read the introduction, where the editors generally say what their
policy on handling names is).  However, by the 14th century, most of
the modern forms of names were already in use in most of northern
France; there are just a few exceptions.  So it has been possible to
match up the modern forms with the most likely spelling that would
have been used in period.

The names are names of royalty, nobility, and gentry; they are the
names of children and adults.  A few useful things can be said about
the constructions of the names.  By the end of the 14th century,
inherited surnames (like modern day surnames) were pretty much the
norm throughout northern France.  However, I found no evidence that
women _ever_ took the byname of their husband.  That they didn't do
this is clear in many of the entries, where a woman is listed as a
man's wife and as the inheritor of her parents's property or money.
All situations were like this

X Surname1, wife of Y Surname2, daughter of Father Surname1 and
Mother Surname3.

Most of the surnames were ones based on locations.  I do not know how
much this fact was influenced by the high standing of these women;
in generally, locative bynames are less common among the lower classes.
There are, however, quite a few surnames that were originally 
descriptives.

A small class of the surnames were used literally, and these are ones
of the form <X Y, dite Z>, where 'dite' is the feminine word for
'called'.  I found four examples in this data:

Anne Le Clerc, dite Coictier, 1582 
Marie de La Baume, dite Le Blanc, 1581 
Nicole Girard dite Gaschon, 1582 
Catherine Gorguin dite de Chevyeres, 1538

One other example is found in a difference source, from Paris,
in 1421: <dite de Ruit>. [3]

In each of these cases, what follows <dite> is a second surname.
The reason that I classify these as literal, instead of inherited,
is that I saw no evidence of both a father and a daughter using
the same <dit X> (masculine) or <dite X> (surname).  The second
reason is that if these weren't literal, there would be no need
for <dite> to match the gender of the bearer (witness <Anne Le
Clerc>.  <Le> is the masculine word for 'the', and if this
phrase literally described <Anne>, it would have used <la>, the
feminine word.)

Double give names came into use in France during the last century
of our period, but they were never common.  In this data set of 
1953 women, I found two examples of women with two given names,
and two examples of women with compound given names.  The first
was recorded in 1573, 1577, and 1585 each time with a slightly
different name (remember, all of these spellings have been
modernized):

Béatrice du Moustier
Catherine Béatrix du Moustier
Catherine-Béatrice du Moustier

The other example of two given names is:

Henriette Catherine de Balsac, 1612

And the examples of compound given names are:
Jeanne-Baptiste de Rippe, 1609
Esther-Chrétienne, 1572

The first is clearly identifiable as referring to John the Baptist.
The second has me somewhat baffled.  One possibility is that this
is the name of a converted Jew, but I have nothing beyond a hunch to
back this up.

So, the practice of using more than one given name or having a compound
given name was _extremely_ rare for a woman, even at the end of our
period.

On to the names themselves.  First a bit about the modernization.
The use of the acute accent in written French came into use in the last 
two centuries of our period, but it wasn't used uniformly.  Any time
that you see names that uniformly use the acute accent, it is likely
that the source has normalized the names to some extent.  The grave
accent was even less common, so if it shows up consistently, that's
another clue that the names have been modernized to some extent.  In
these cases, the easiest way to determine the likely period spelling
of the name is to simply drop the accents.  This doesn't work 100% of
the time, but it's a good start.  The circumflex accent, and the way
it replaces an <s> following a vowel, on the other hand, is strictly 
modern.

There were three other clues that I had that the names had been
modernized, and this was in the presence of names in their modern
form where I have found _no_ evidence for the modern forms before
1600: modern <Jeanne>, <Etienne> (masculine), and <Chrétienne>.
All of the evidence that I have ever seen shows these as <Jehanne>,
<Estienne>, and <Chréstienne> before 1600.

The top 10 most popular feminine names are pretty unremarkable:

_Modern_	_Medieval_	_Number_
Jeanne		Jehanne		298
Marie		Marie		237
Marguerite	Marguerite	148
Catherine	Catherine	136
		Katherine
Anne		Anne		123
Françoise	Françoise	105
Louise		Louise		83
Madeleine	Madeleine	80
Charlotte	Charlotte	50
Jacqueline	Jacqueline	50

A few things to note: Note the overwhelming popularity of
<Jehanne>.  Masculine and feminine forms of <John> are without
question the most popular medieval names in any culture and in
pretty much ANY time (after about the 11th century or so).  In
many cases, it's not unsurprising to see it be 2 to 3 times more
popular than the next given name (in fact here, the popularity
of <Marie> with respect to <Jehanne> is somewhat surprising).
Forms of <Margaret> and <Catherine> are also common throughout
most of Europe in most periods; these were the names of two
highly revered saints.  <Anne> was less common until the 15th
century, but in the 16th quickly began to hold its own among
other names in France and England.

The last five are rather specific to France; forms of <Madeleine>
and <Jacqueline> are rare outside of France (you see them some
in Germany and the Low Countries), and feminine forms of <Frances>
and <Charles> were more common in France than other places.

Now, on to the more unusual names found in this source (when I
give only one form, it is both the medieval and modern spelling):

Claude, 34 examples.  This name is found with almost equal
popularity between men and women, used in the same form for both.
Nicole, 16 examples, is the same; this spelling is used for both
men and women.

Gabrielle, 16 examples.  This was one of those names which, up 
until I had worked with this source, had always been "Well, it's
extremely likely that <Gabriel> was feminized in France by the
end of our period, but we just haven't found any explicit
examples of it yet".  So it was rather pleasant to find them, and
find so many.

Philippe, 12 examples.  This is generally found as a masculine name,
but there were 12 instances of it being used by women.

Elisabeth, 6 examples.  French forms of Elizabeth until the 16th
century were uniformly along the lines of <Ysabeau>, <Isabelle>,
<Isabeau>, etc.  These 6 examples from the early 17th century
perhaps show influence of Queen Elizabeth I of England.

Avoye, 3 examples, Avoie, 2 examples.  I note this name merely
because it is completely unidentifiable to me.

Ide, 2 examples.  The bearers of these names were grandmother and
granddaughter; the granddaughter was the inheritor of the grandmother.
I do not know if this had any influence on the choice of name of
the grandchild, but it might have.

Angélique (modern), Angelique (probable period form), 1 example.  
This name of a saint is one that has tormented the College of Arms 
for many years - there have been no clear examples of this name before 
the end of our period.  This solves that problem definitively.

Arthuze, 1 example.  Another baffling name.  Perhaps related to
<Arthur>, which was Latinized <Arthus>?

Colaye, 1 example, Collaye, 1 example.  Yet another name which I
cannot identify.

Fleur de Lys, 2 examples, Fleur de Lis, 1 example. "Flower of the 
lily", also the name of a heraldic charge.  I'd love to see someone 
use this given name with a badge using a fleur-de-lys.  (While there 
isn't examples of people using charges in their arms that reflect 
their given names, there IS an example of someone having a badge that 
reflected their given name, a Princess Marguerite who had a daisy for 
a badge).

Eucharistie, 1 example.  Clearly based on the word <eucharist>.  
There are other names which follow this sourt of pattern, namely
forms of <Tiphaine> (English <Tiffany>) based on <theophany>,
i.e., epiphany) and <Natalia> (the precursor to <Noelle>), but this 
is the only instance of <Eucharistie> that I have ever seen, and 
the only name based on a religious occurrence that isn't a holiday.

Fleurance, 1 example, Florance, 1 example.  Clearly variants of the
same name, related to French <fleur>, Latin <flora> 'flower'

Florentine, 1 example.  I cannot say whether this is related to
<Florance> above or to <Florence> the city in Italy (which also
takes it's name from Latin <flora>).

George, 1 example.  Yup, a woman named <George>.

Lyse, 1 example.  Perhaps the feminization of an unattested <Lys>,
but more likely a variant of <Lis>, <Lys> 'lily'.

Olarye, 1 example.  Probably the same name as <Eulalia>/<Hilaria>
(for which see Academy of S. Gabriel Report #2909
http://www.s-gabriel.org/2909 for a fascinating discussion of this
name).

Souveraine, 1 example.  This is a feminine form of French <souverain>
'sovereign', being used as a given name.  Other examples of titles
being used as given names include <Dauphine>, (feminine of <dauphin>,
the title for the heir to the throne of France) 4 examples, and
<Marquise>, feminine of <Marquis>, 1 example.

Vandeline, 1 example, Vaudeline, 1 example.  The same woman was
recorded by both these names.  Pretty clearly one is a scribal
mistake for the other, <n> and <u> being hard to distinguish in some
scripts.  However, I don't recognize either so I can't say which is
the "real" name and which is the mistake.

One last discussion before wrapping this up, and that is on feminizations
of masculine names.  Many many many feminine names are feminized forms
of masculine names.  Men's names were feminized in two ways in French:
One is to simply add <e>, and the other is to double the final 
consonant and add <e>.  I have yet to see a clear pattern of when to go
one way and when to go the other, and suspect that in many cases, it
simply doesn't matter.

We have:

_Feminine form_		_Masculine form_
Adrienne		Adrien
Aimée			Aimé
Alphonsine		Alphonsin
Andrée			André
Annette			Annet
Antoinette		Antoinet
Aymée			Aymé
Bastienne		Bastien
Bernarde		Bernard
Berraude		Berraud
Berthaude		Berthaud
Bertrande		Bertrand
Béraude			Béraud
Charlotte		Charlot
Chrestienne		Chrestien
Christiane		Christian
Colette			Colet
Denise			Denis
Edmée			Edmé
Emée			Emé
Estiennette		Estiennet
Françoise		François
Gabrielle		Gabriel
Germaine		Germain
Geuffrine		Geuffrin
Gilberte		Gilbert
Gilette			Gilet
Gillette		Gillet
Giraude			Giraud
Guillemette		Guillemet
Guillemine		Guillemin
Guyonne			Guyon
Géraude			Géraud
Henriette		Henriet
Huguette		Huguet
Jacquette		Jacquet
Jamette			Jamet
Jehanette		Jehanet
Jehanne			Jehan
Joachine		Joachim		(this is the one exception)
Julienne		Julien
Juliette		Juliet
Louise			Louis
Léonarde		Léonard
Martine			Martin
Mathurine		Mathurin
Michelle		Michel
Nicolette		Nicolet
Odette			Odet
Perette			Peret
Perrette		Perret
Perrine			Perrin
Philiberte		Philibert
Pierrette		Pierret
Pérette			Perette
Raymonde		Raymond
Regnaude		Regnaud
Renée			René
Richarde		Richard
Roberte			Roberte
Robine			Robin
Robinette		Robinet
Simone			Simon
Simonne			Simon
Thierrie		Thierri
Thomasse		Thomas
Urbane			Urban
Valentine		Valentin
Victoire		Victoir
Vincente		Vincent

One of the fun parts about working through this data is that I found so
many feminized forms of masculine names that I had never seen before.
Many names which are very common among men - <Robin>, <Richard>, 
<Raymond>, even <Joachim> - I'd comment to myself that I'd never seen
feminine forms of, and then no more than two pages later, I'd _find_
one.  It was like a gold mine. :)

That covers pretty much everything I have to say right now about late-
period French feminine names.

Any questions?

No assignment for this lesson - not yet, I've got one planned for the
future. :)

-Aryanhwy

--
References:

[1] Archives nationales (France), _Hommages rendus à la Chambre de France: 
Chambre des comptes de Paris, série P, XIVe-XVIe siècles: inventaire 
analytique_ (Paris: Les Archives: Diffusé par la Documentation française, 
1982-1985.), volumes 1-3

[2] Uckelman, Sara L. "Late Period French Feminine Names" (WWW: Self-
published, 2005)
http://www.ellipsis.cx/~liana/names/french/latefrench.html

[3] Friedemann, Sara L. "French Names from Paris, 1421, 1423, & 1438"
(WWW: Self-published 2002-2003)
http://www.ellipsis.cx/~liana/names/french/paris1423.html



-- 
vita sine literis mors est
http://www.ellipsis.cx/~liana/
_______________________________________________
heraldry-school mailing list
heraldry-school@xxxxxxxxxxx
http://lists.ellipsis.cx/mailman/listinfo/heraldry-school