ANSTHRLD - Too much documentation?!

doug bell magnus77840 at hotmail.com
Wed Apr 18 11:14:58 PDT 2001


>A reasonably solid name shouldn't need many sheets of paper.

Daniel has never endured the terror of documenting a Turkish or eastern 
European name.  Documentation looks like an epistle the size St Paul would 
write to support them.  They have no books on the no photocopy list.  Few 
SCA heralds have ever seen them so even basic name construction has to be 
heavily documented.  This is addition to documenting the name elements to 
period.
Often sources are in a language few can read and you find small pieces of 
evidence from many sources.  This adds to the volume. Indirect evidence has 
to be used to build a case and this takes up more room.  Since there are few 
sources you often have to send everything you can find and make sure a good 
1 page summery get included.

Names like Cyneric is interested in will require considerably more copies 
than normal because it is a little explored area in SCA research.

1) Document each element of the name to period with items
such as inscriptions.  There may be some sources in later period writings 
such as Bede in Britain to help.
I don't know of any good sources on the continent.  The Angles like the 
Vikings didn't write as much as other peoples, just mostly rune carvings.
In the mid 400s western Rome was going to hell and taking the classical 
world with it.  Many sources from that period I know of are in Irish 
monasteries and help not at all.  Gildas is from 538 in England but he 
doesn't mention
many names.  He is mostly telling folks about rainstorms of blood, someone 
turning the sun on and off, and the world ending.  Reads like Revelation of 
St John.
I know you already have read the AS chronicle as an example of a later 
source to work back from.

You should transliterate the runes into standard English alphabet.  
Documentation can be from academic papers or books on archeaology of the 
Angles on the continent.  Copies of a picture of the rune stone or 
inscription are helpful if you find them.  Also give a source with the name 
rendered in our alphabet by a scholar if you have them.

2) Next document the name construction as given name, patronymic, clan or 
tribe name was a form used by the Angles with as much information as you 
have.  Demonstrate that each name fits into the category it is in.

In short send up all sources that support your case.  Summarize them in a 
way that takes an ignorant reader step by step to the desired conclusion: 
this name is period and correctly formed.  Sounds like you have most of what 
you need.

Good luck
Magnus von Lubeck

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