[ANSTHRLD] Re: Dunno

[doug bell]

I can't reference much on Dunno because my copies of
Tengvik and Pre Conquest Domesday names have disappeared.

Searle has some information.
Dun is the OE form.  Donn is Gaelic.

David Dun is mentioned from a quitclaim to the bishop
of Glasgow in 1260.  Thomas Dun from 1296 was hanged
for stealing books and vestments from a church.  So
it survived as a surname.  This early it could be argued
it was a descriptive byname for dark.

Iames dates to mid 1100s in England.
The surname, meaning son of James,
was used in Scots in the beginning of the 1300s with
a family who held the office of Crowner of Bute.
That is a little late to have Old English still in use.

To venture a guess at a Scots form Don Jamieson is
as close as I can get.  In Gaelic it would be
Donn mac Séamus.

If we look at English Jameson is dated form 1379
from Yorkshire and north England.  I would say
this is lowland Scots influence.  So Dunn Jameson
might be formed in English.

Would Old English names like Dunno still have been
used in 1379 with Middle English?

Magnus von Lubeck


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