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Early Medieval Manx Names

by Heather Rose Jones

© 2006 by Heather Rose Jones, all rights reserved

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Ogham Inscriptions
• Latin Inscriptins
• Runic Inscriptions
• The Inscriptions
• Name Patterns
• Glossary
• Masculine Given Names
• Feminine Given Names
• Adjectival Bynames
• Occupational Bynames
• Placenames
• Connecting and Function Words

Introduction

Information about personal names in the Isle of Man is extremely sparse before the Early Modern period, and what we know comes from occasional references to Manx individuals in the historic chronicles or by neighboring cultures, and from a variety of commemorative stone inscriptions. These inscriptions reflect the cultural diversity of the medieval Manx people and the succession of cultures that dominated the island: Irish Ogham inscriptions, Norse Runes, and the Roman alphabet. The single most comprehensive source on these that I've found is Manx Crosses: or The Inscribed and Sculptured Monuments of the Isle of Man from about the End of the Fifth to the Beginning of the Thirteenth Century by P.M.C. Kermode (London: Bemrose & Sons Ltd., 1907). The date of this publication makes me wish for something a little more recent, as there has been a lot of progress in dating and analyizing inscriptions since then -- but most more recent work tends to be commentaries on works such as this, rather than new, comprehensive works, and the time I had to devote to this article did not allow for tracking down this newer material, for which I hope the reader will forgive me. While specific dates may have been adjusted by more recent scholarship, the dates given here are probably generally correct, and the actual readings of the inscriptions are unlikely to have changed much. The Ogham and Runic inscriptions are given only in transcription (to the Roman alphabet), following Kermode.

Ogham Inscriptions

The oldest inscriptions are in Ogham letters and date to the period when Man was dominated by Gaelic culture. Most are from the 5-6th centuries, according to Kermode, but this is a field where there has been a lot of revision of opinion. The names are essentially identical to those found in Ogham inscriptions in Ireland at the same period.

• DOVAIDONA MAQUI DROATA "[the stone] of Dovaidu son of Droat"
• BIVAIDONAS MAQUI MUCOI CUNAVA "[the stone] of Bivaidu, son of the Conava tribe"
• CUNAMAGLI MAQ... "[the stone] of Conmael, son..."
• ... MAQLEOG... uncertain, and probably incomplete

Latin Inscriptions

There are only three early inscriptions in Latin letters. Kermode doesn't suggest a date for them, but the general form places them somewhere in the second half of the first millenium, and they are all Christian in character, narrowing the date further. Only two of the three include personal names:

• AVITI MONOMENTI "the monument of Avitus"
• CRUX GURIAT "the cross of Guriat" (the name is found in Welsh as Gwriad)

Runic Inscriptions

There is a much larger body of surviving runic inscriptions, and the simple fact that they use runes places them in the period when Norse culture predominated on the island. After much detailed discussion, Kermode concludes that the runic inscriptions date primarily to the 11th century. Other, more recent, scholarship broadens that to the 10-12th century. The inscriptions are full of personal names, being primarily memorial inscriptions.

Linguistically the name elements are a mixture of Gaelic, Norse, and even the occasional Old English element, all mixed together in the same name or same family. Whatever the name's origins, it is recorded here in a somewhat idiosyncratic Norse-based spelling, as we would expect for someone writing with runes. So, for example, the name MAIL BRIKTI has its origins in the Gaelic name Mael Brigde, but it is written the way a Norse speaker would have interpreted the sounds.

I've used Kermode's reference numbers in the following transcriptions, and note that the names often appear in a possessive or other grammatical form, and might need to be adjusted, depending on how you plan to use them in a name.

Note: due to compatibility issues with representing the "thorn" symbol in html, I have transcribed it here simply as "th". All examples of "th" in the transcriptions of the runes should be understood as representing a thorn symbol. Similarly, the use of "dh" in the transcriptions stands for the letter "edh".

The Inscriptions

Only the portions of the inscriptions involving personal names are included here. Ellipses indicate parts of the inscription that have been omitted (not parts that are missing in the original inscription).

1. BLAGKMON

• This literally means "black-man", but this was also an Old English given name.

2. UFAIK ... KAUTR ... SUNR BIARNAR FRA KULI

• The inscription includes two individuals: Ofeig and Gaut son of Bjorn from Cooley.

3. MAIL BRIKTI SUNR ATHKANS SMITH ... KAUT

• This references two individuals again. Mael Brigde, son of Athakan the smith. The second name appears to be the same Gaut from #2 -- in both cases he is noted as the carver of the stone.

5. OULAIBR LIUTULBSUNR ... ULB

• Two individuals are mentioned: Olaf Liotulfson and Ulf (his son).

6. OSRUTHR

• Ásrøth

9. THURSTAIN ... UFAAK SUN KRINAIS

• Two individuals are mentioned: Thorstein and Ofeig, son of Crina (the second name is in the dative case).

11. TRUIAN SURTUFKALS ... ATHMIUL KUNU SINA

• Two individuals again: Druian, son of Dugald and Athmaoil his wife.

13. KRIM ... RUMUN

• Two individuals again: Grim and Hromund (in the dative).

14. KRIMS INS SUARTA

• The whole name appears in the genitive: [of] Grim the black.

15. THURUALTR

• Thorwald

16. SONTULF HIN SUARTI ... ARINBIAURK KUINU SINA

Two individuals: Sandulf the black and Arinbjörg his wife (the latter in the accusative case).

17. MAL LUMKUN ... MAL MURU FUSTRA SINE TOTIR TUFKALS ... ATHISL

• This one mentions three individuals: Mael Lomchon, Mal-Mura his foster-[mother] daughter of Dugald (all this in the dative), and Athisl

18. JUALFIR SUNR THURULFS HINS RAUTHA ... FRITHU MUTHUR SINO

• Two individuals: Joalf son of Thorolf the Red and Fritha his mother (in the dative).

20. THURLIBR NHAKI ... FIAK HUN SIN ... HABRS

• Three individuals: Thorleif Hnakki, Fiac his son, and Hafr (in the genitive).

21. UTR ... FROKA

• Two individuals: Odd and Fraka (in the dative).

22. IN ROSKITIL

• A reference to a location, although not in a personal name: in Rosketel.

23. THURBIAURN

• Thorbjorn

24. ASRITHI KUNU SINA TUTUR UTS

• The whole name is in the dative: Asridh his wife, daughter of Odd.

25. MURKIALU ... UKIFAT ... RA{TH}IFRIT ... THURITH

• Four individuals, all in the dative: Murgial, Ukifat, Rathfrid, and Thurith.

26 & 27 IUAN BRIST

• John priest

Name Patterns

The above gives a notion of how the whole names are put together. As a summary of the name patterns (other than single given names) and editing out interpolated references (e.g., "X [his wife] Y's daughter") we find the following.

Type 1: Given name + Byname

Type 1A: Adjectives with definite article (nominative (H)IN, genitive (H)INS; the adjective also needs to be in the appropriate form).

KRIMS INS SUARTA Grim the black

SONTULF HIN SUARTI Sandulf the black

and the same in a patronym

THURULFS HINS RAUTHA [of] Thorolf the Red

Type 1B: Occupations, with no definite article (appearing in the same grammatical case as the name they're associated with).

IUAN BRIST John priest

and the same in a patronym

ATHKANS SMITH [of] Athakan the smith

Type 2: Given name + Patronym

Type 2A: With the patronymic marker (nominative SUNR "son" or TOTIR "daughter") before the father's name. The father's entire name needs to be in the genitive case.

UFAAK SUN KRINAIS Ofeig, son of Crina

TRUIAN SURTUFKALS Druian, son of Dugald

MAL MURU TOTIR TUFKALS Mal-Mura daughter of Dugald

ASRITHI TUTUR UTS Asridh daughter of Odd

Type 2B: With the patronymic marker after the father's name. When followed by SUNR, the genitive "-S" on the father's name seems to be omitted, but this would probably not be done if followed by TOTIR.

OULAIBR LIUTULBSUNR Olaf Liotulfson

Type 3: Given name + Patronym with byname (FRA "from, of" expects the following word to be in the dative)

KAUTR SUNR BIARNAR FRA KULI Gaut Bjornson from Cooley

MAIL BRIKTI SUNR ATHKANS SMITH Mael Brigde, son of Athakan the smith

JUALFIR SUNR THURULFS HINS RAUTHA Joalf son of Thorolf the Red

Glossary of Name Elements

Kermode also supplies a glossary of the name elements and notes on their grammatical form, which I've cribbed from as follows (with my own additions of likely nominative and genitive forms -- the ones most useful in forming personal names). Norse case information is from E.H. Lind Norsk-Islandsk Dopnamn ock Fingerade Namn fran Medeltiden (Uppsala: Lundequistska Bokhandeln, 1915), E.V. Gordon An Introduction to Old Norse (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1974), and Alan Bower A Synopsis of Old Icelandic Morphology (Traverse City: Stonehill Publishing Co., 1994), but my suggestions have attempted to follow the sound and spelling rules in the runic material rather than using "standard" forms, and any errors in interpretation here are entirely my own. The pattern for the glossary entries is as follows.

Runic form

• normalized gloss (in the language of origin)
• grammatical case
• gender
• language of origin
• notes, including suggested forms in other grammatical cases that match the runic forms

I have summarized the relevant grammatical forms in a table for each section, with my reconstructions marked with an asterisk.

Masculine Given Names

ATHAKANS

• Aeducán
• genitive
• masc.
• Gaelic
• The nominative would presumably be ATHAKAN

ATHISL

• Adhisl
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• In Lind it appears as Adhisl, genitive uncertain, but possibly identical.

BIARNAR

• Björn
• genitive
• masc.
• Norse
• Expected nominative BIAURN.

FIAK

• Fiacc
• accusative
• masc.
• Gaelic
• The nominative should be identical, and we might expect the genitive to be FIAKS.

FROKA

• Frakki
• accusative
• masc.
• Norse
• The genitive would be identical to the accusative, FROKA, and we'd expect a nominative like FROKI.

HABRS

• Hafr
• genitive
• masc.
• Norse
• The nominative would be simply HABR.

IUALFIR

• Jóalfr
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• The genitive would appear to be IUALFS.

IUAN

• Jóan, i.e., John
• nominative
• masc.
• Latin
• We'd expect genitive IUANS.

KAUTR, KAUT

• Gautr
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• The usual nominative form has the final -R, but one variant here drops it. The genitive would be expected to be KAUTS.

KRIM

• Grimr
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• As with KAUT, the expected nominative -R has been omitted. The genitive KRIMS also occurs in the inscriptions.

KRINAIS

• Crina?
• genitive
• masc.
• Probably Gaelic
• Presumably the nominative would be KRINAI.

LIUTULBS

• Ljótulfr
• genitive
• masc.
• Norse
• The expected nominative would be LIUTULBR.

MAIL BRIKTI

• Mael Brigde
• nominative
• masc.
• Gaelic
• Based on the way the declension is treated in accusative MAL MURU, we might expect this entire set of names to be treated as weak-declension nouns, in which case we'd expect the genitive here to be MAIL BRIKTA, but this is not at all certain, and the example of MAL LUMKIN suggests that nominatives for these names may have no inflectional ending.

MAL LUMKUN

• Mael Lomchon
• nominative
• masc.
• Gaelic
• Possibly with genitive MAL LUMKUNA, but see under MAIL BRIKTI.

NHAKI

• Hnakki
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• The genitive would presumably be NHAKA.

OULAIBR

• Áleifr, i.e., Olaf
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• The genitive would presumably be OULAIBS.

OSRUTHR

• Ásrødhr
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• Genitive uncertain but possibley OSRUTHS

RATHIFRIT

• Radhfrit
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• We'd expect a final "-R" (or possibly "-IR") in the nominative, and a genitive RATHIFRITAR.

RUMUN

• Hrómundr
• accusative
• masc.
• Norse
• If the Manx simplification of "-nd-" to "-n" holds for all cases, we'd expect nominative RUMUNR and genitive RUMUNAR.

SONTULF

• Sandulfr
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• Again we see the expected final "-R" dropped in the nominative; the expected genitive would be SONTULFS.

THURBIAURN

• Thorbjorn
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• Based on the genitive of the uncompounded name appearing as BIARNAR, we'd expect a genitive THURBIARNAR here.

THURLIBR

• Thorleifr
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• We'd expect a genitive THURLIBS.

THURULFS

• Thorolfr
• genitive
• masc.
• Norse
• We'd expect a nominative like THURULFR.

THURSTAIN

• Thorsteinn
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• We'd expect a genitive THURSTAINS.

THURUALTR

• Thorvaldr
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• We'd expect a genitive THURVALTS.

TRUIAN

• Druian
• nominative
• masc.
• Gaelic
• Kermode indicates that this name also appears in the Manx place-name Glen Truan; the best guess for a genitive might be TRUIANS.

TUFKALS

• Dubghall
• genitive
• masc.
• Gaelic
• The nominative would presumably be TUFKAL.

UFAIK, UFAAK

• Ufeigr
• accusative
• masc.
• Norse
• In Lind it appears as Ófeigr, we'd expect nominative UFAIKR or UFAAKR, and genitive UFAIKS or UFAAKS.

UKIFAT

• ???
• nominative
• masc.
• Uncertain origin.
• Carmode notes what is probably the same name appearing as Ugfadhan in the Annals of the Four Masters, but this doesn't help identify the origin. Any suggestion of a genitive would be pure guesswork, but I would suggest UKIFATS.

ULB, ULF

• Ulfr
• accusative
• masc.
• Norse
• The accusative form shows up not only as the simple name ULB but in the compound given names SONTULF and LIUTULB. The genitive shows up as ULFS in the compound given name THURULFS, and we might expect ULBS as a possible alternate form. The standard nominative would be expected to be ULFR or ULBR.

UTR

• Oddr
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• The genitive UTS also occurs in the material.

Note: Forms in the tables that are prefixed by an asterisk (*) are reconstructions. Forms without the asterisk are taken directly from the inscriptions.

Feminine Given Names

ARINBIAURK

• Arinbjörg
• accusative
• fem.
• Norse
• The nominative appears to be identical, and the genitive looks like it should be ARINBIARKAR.

ASRITHI

• Ásrídhr
• accusative
• fem.
• Norse
• We expect nominative ASRITHR, genitive ASRITHAR.

ATHMIUL

• Athmail?
• accusative
• fem.
• Gaelic origin, but it's uncertain what it corresponds to
• The grammatical forms are uncertian, but the nominative may be identical.

FRITHU

• Fridha
• accusative
• fem.
• Norse
• The genitive would be identical to the accusative, FRITHU, and the nominative would be expected to be FRITHA.

MAL MURU

• Mael Muire
• accusative
• fem.
• Gaelic
• Possibly with nominative MAL MURA and genitive identical to the accusative, but see under MAIL BRIKTI. In Ireland, this name was also masculine, for which we might expect nominative MAL MURI and genitive MAL MURA, but this is highly speculative.

MURKIALU

• Muirgel
• accusative
• fem.
• Gaelic
• The genitive would probably be identical to the accusative, but it is unclear whether the nominative would take a standard weak declensional form of MURKIALA or be closer to the Gaelic form as MURKIAL.

THURITH

• Thurídhr
• nominative
• fem.
• Norse
• Note that the expected nominative ending has been omitted as in some other names; we'd expect a genitive something like THURITHAR, and a more regular nominative along the lines of THURITHR or perhaps THURITHIR.

Adjectival Bynames

RAUTHA

• Raudhr
• genitive
• masc.
• Norse
• Byname meaning "red"; the nom. masc. would be RAUTHI, nom. fem. RAUTHA, gen. fem. RAUTHU.

SUARTA

• Svartr
• genitive
• masc.
• Norse
• "Black", used in adjectival bynames; the masculine nominative would be SUARTI (an identical accusative form occurs in the data), the feminine nominative SUARTA, and the feminine genitive SUARTU. Because the only examples of adjectival bynames in the data use the definite article, those are the forms I give here. The grammatical forms of the adjective used directly after a noun (or name) would be different and are not given.

Occupational Bynames

BRIST

• Prestr
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• "Priest", as a byname. The expected genitive would be BRISTS.

SMITH

• smidhr
• genitive
• masc.
• Norse
• "Smith", occupational byname; as in some given names, we see the expected inflectional ending has been omitted; we'd expect genitive SMITHAR and nominative SMITHR.

(Only masculine forms are given as it is unlikelythat women would have used these bynames -- particularly "priest".)

Placenames

KULI

• Cooley (Gaelic form uncertain)
• dative
• n/a
• Gaelic

ROSKITIL

• Hrossketill
• nominative
• n/a
• Norse
• In a personal name, we'd expect this in a locative construction requiring the dative, which would presumably be ROSKITILI.

KURNATHAL

• Kornadal
• dative
• n/a
• Norse
• The given dative form is what would occur in a locative byname.

MAUN

• Mön
• accusative
• n/a
• Place-name "Man".
• We'd need the dative to use this in a locative byname which seems likely to be identical to the accusative in this case, but this is uncertain.

(In use, the same form would be found for both men and women.)

Connecting and Function Words

Relationships

SUNR

• sunr
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse "son".
• The expected genitive would be SUNAR, although this would only appear in a name with two generations of patronyms, a pattern which does not occur in the data..

TOTIR

• dóttir
• nominative
• fem.
• Norse "daughter".
• The accusative appears as TUTUR and the genitive should be identical to the accusative (but would be extremely unlikely to appear in a personal name).

KONA

• kona
• nominative form used in the inscription for the expected accusative
• fem.
• Norse "wife".
• Several inscriptions identify women as wives of an earlier-mentioned individual, although none actually use the formula "X wife of Y", but as this formula can be found elsewhere in Norse material, and as wife identifications do appear in the Manx material, this is a plausible construction in parallel with the patronyms. (The dative form also occurs in the inscriptions as KUNU and KUINU, but this form would not be used in the usual form of a personal name.)

Other Vocabulary

FRA

• fr{a'}
• preposition, takes the dative
• Norse
• Used in locative bynames, "from"

HIN

• hinn
• nominative
• masc.
• Norse
• Definite article ("the"). The genitive appears in the inscriptions as HINS and INS. Used with adjectival bynames. Although there are no examples in the inscriptions of women with this sort of byname, the feminine forms of the definite article would be nominative (H)IN, genitive (H)INNAR). So, for example, the byname "the black" would appear as:

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