Collected Name Resources from LoARs (2010-present): - Documentation -
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Collected Name Resources from LoARs (2010-present)

Articles from Juliana de Luna, Lillia de Vaux, and Alys Mackyntoich

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- Documentation -

December 2010 - Juliana de Luna Link to LoAR Cover Letter

This ongoing series about sources and problems in documentation is getting hijacked this month to discuss how we talk about documentation. The term documented is used for two independent ideas. First, it refers to the broad idea of demonstrating that the submitter may use a particular element: one may, for example, speak of documenting that Lilie is a submitter's legal name. Second, it refers to the idea that a particular element is dated to before 1650. In the draft rules, we are trying to separate these two ideas by using documented for the broad idea and attested to refer to the idea that an element is found in period. We encourage you to do the same.

Things get more complicated as we move from clearly attested elements to elements that are created in various ways. Again, we have vocabulary to discuss that creation, depending on how closely the submitted element matches attested forms. One common pattern for submissions is to create a spelling variant of an attested name by using either multiple attested forms or information about spelling variation in other attested forms. For example, in this month's acceptances, we registered Kirsten on the basis of Kristen and Kyrstin, two forms of the same name attested in the 15th century according to Lind. We call this creation of spelling variants interpolation.

Finally, we come to constructed names. We say that a name is constructed if it takes elements that are attested to period, but puts them together to make a name that is not attested. These include bynames that are constructed from attested given names (so taking an attested Bjartmarr to construct a patronymic byname Bjartmarsson), while others take two elements (from a dithemic name like Ælfmund - made up of Ælf- and -mund or a placename like Sheepford, made up of Sheep- and -ford).

October 2017 - Alys Mackyntoich Link to LoAR Cover Letter

In this month's installment, I would like to call attention to the online articles in the Proceedings from the Known World Heralds and Scribes Symposium, which can be found here: http://heraldry.sca.org/kwhss/. The Proceedings from 2013-2017 are currently available online.

The articles available include a wide variety of onomastic topics, as well as articles covering the heraldic process. The following process articles may be of particular help to name heralds:

  • Simple Guide to Summarizing Name Documentation by Alys Mackyntoich (KWHSS 2015)

  • Commenting On Letters of Intent by Brunissende Dragonette (KWHSS 2014)

  • Intermediate Heraldic Research by Lillia de Vaux (KWHSS 2014)

  • Using The Name Pattern Search Form by Tanczos Istvan (KWHSS 2014)

  • Documenting a Name (not quite within an inch of its life) by Juliana de Luna (KWHSS 2013)

Unsurprisingly, the advice in my article on summarizing name documentation is a good guide for how I would like to see documentation formatted for me as Pelican.

The Proceedings also include numerous articles on names from specific cultures and time periods. I highly recommend name heralds taking time to peruse the available articles. Many of them contain names that are not documentable from other sources.

Articles from KWHSS Proceedings are considered no-photocopy sources under Appendix H.

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