msmcknittington

Which name do you guys prefer as a replacement for Lady Maisry's name? Given that Maisry appears to be from the 18th century and Scottish, I don't want to use it in 13th century Wales.

I'd really prefer it if I could find something that still sounded pretty but actually meant "horrible person with a black heart", but girls don't tend to get named things like that.

So, the two choices I've discovered are sound-alikes, but Welsh. They might not be 13th century or even medieval, but they're a heck of a lot closer than Maisry and also avoid that whole "Isn't that a ballad?" thing.

Mairwen -- Combination of Welsh form of Mary (Mair) with gwen, which means "white, fair, blessed". I guess it could mean anything from "blessed virgin" to "white sea of bitterness", so there's a range of meanings there.

Meinwen -- Means "slender and white", from the Welsh main, meaning "slender", and gwen. I'm sort of imagining Lady not-Maisry as a sort of cross between Lady Macbeth and Galadriel from Lord of the Rings. Ambitious and social climbing, but tall and slender and fair. Also a mega-bitch.

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..which is totally made up, but hey...

Ooh, it reminds me of Marlys. Which is the name of a perfectly wretched person in a novel I cannot remember the name of. I think it's the hero's lame girlfriend in AS Byatt's Possession.

ETA: Blah! I remember what novel it's from. It's from a weird Teresa Medeiros medieval romance. It's an absolutely bizarre book. Marlys is the name of the hero's crazy sister who is a murderer, only no one knows it but her. There was also some weird sexual vibe between the sister and the heroine. I was kind of rooting for them to get together, because they had more chemistry than the hero and the heroine.

Edited 2008-11-16 09:44 (UTC)

Ohhhh, I love Possession. That book just sucked me in and was juat...magical. I've been dying to read it again, but it's packed away somewhere in our Boxes of Books Awaiting Bookshelves (5 years and counting!).

Ahem. Back on topic, I picked Mairwen. Of the two, it flows better as a name, I think.

I know! It's one of my absolute favorite books. I lent my copy to my sister a couple years ago and she still has it. :( It's one of the few books I can quote lines from, because I just do not have a mind that uses quotes well.

I like Mairwen - it flows better than the second. But I have also added another: Meinir which means Maiden. Its my middle name and is pronounced "my-nee-ir".

Oh, Bess, you've been so kind I could not possibly name the Welsh Lady Macbeth after you! It would be too weird.

Unless, of course, you have an evil side you do not show. ;)

Haven't you been following my Ghost-y activities at Kentwell? ;-)

...Maybe it's just me but Mairwen sounds really close to the masculine (modern) name Marwan/Marwen/Marwin. (I might just be pronouncing it wrong in my head too.) Given the likely audience, I'd say go with something different....

It's pronounced Mare-wen, basically. Like the female horse plus the word when. I've never heard of any of those other names before, though. I've heard of Marvin/Mervin but not those.

Searching Behind the Name shows me that Marwin is the German form of Marvin, and it's pronounced Mar-veen.

Marwan is a common boys name in most of the Arabic speaking world. (It can also be spelled Marwen.) It is pronounced slightly different (long A versus short A) but my modern brain is still saying it's just too masculine sounding. Again, it's probably just me. :-)

I was just going to suggest asking Bess... I see she beat me to it! Bess knows a thing or five about Welsh stuff, seeing as she was born there... ;)

Bess has been absolutely wonderful through all my Welsh angsting. Just very gracious.

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