Collected Name Resources from LoARs (2010-present): - Old Norse -
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Collected Name Resources from LoARs (2010-present)

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

- Old Norse -

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June 2010 - Juliana de Luna Link to LoAR Cover Letter

From Pelican: Some Name Resources

There is an enormous (and growing) number of resources online that can be useful to heralds and to submitters. Each month, I'm going to post information about some that I think might be useful. If I miss some interesting ones, let me know, because I don't know everything.

Since I've asked for commentary about Old Norse transliterations, I thought I'd start there. I'm going to assume that everyone knows about the many great articles at http://www.s-gabriel.org/scandinavian.

In considering this issue, you might look at standardized Old Norse forms, documentary forms in the Latin alphabet, and runic forms. Standardized Old Norse forms may be found in places like Geirr Bassi Haraldsson's The Old Norse Name and Lindorm Eriksson's "The Bynames of the Viking Age Runic Inscriptions" http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/lindorm/runicbynames/. Latin alphabet documentary forms may be found in published sources like E. H. Lind, Norsk-Isländska Dopnamn ock Fingerade Namn från Medeltiden; a few forms from c. 1100 can be found in the Sveriges medeltida personnamn https://www.isof.se/lar-dig-mer/forskning/projekt/projektet-sveriges-medeltida-personnamn-smp. Runic forms may be found in places like Gunnvor silfraharr's "Names of Scandinavians in the Byzantine Varangian Guard and in Russia" http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/gunnvor/varangian/ and in Lena Peterson's Nordiskt runnamnslexikon, at https://www.isof.se/lar-dig-mer/publikationer/publikationer/2007-01-01-nordiskt-runnamnslexikon.

Also useful in dealing with Old Norse are the two important dictionaries of Old Norse, both found online. The more complete and useful is An Icelandic-English Dictionary, by Richard Cleasby and Gudbrand Vigfusson (also known as Cleasby Vigfusson); it includes many specific citations which illustrate usage. I like the copy at http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~kurisuto/germanic/oi_cleasbyvigfusson_about.html. The other dictionary is A Concise Dictionary of Old Icelandic, by Geir T. Zoëga. I use the copy at http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~kurisuto/germanic/oi_zoega_about.html. Dictionaries, of course, must be used with caution, because the majority of words cannot be used as given names or bynames.

I hope that sections like this will be useful; in future months, I plan to discuss resources for other languages and issues.

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