[ANSTHRLD] Is <clericus> a Registerable Byname

[Bob Wade]

Thanks Magnus,

<Tostig clericus> stays clear of the locative problem, but my concern is whether it's being used as a Form of Address in the Domesday Book. (i.e. Is the translation "Tostig the cleric" or "Cleric Tostig"?)  Do you have access to the OED to see if was ever used as a form of address like was found for <dean> in the Aug 2009 Dean Alexander Montgomery Precedent?

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On Fri, 2/7/14, Doug Bell <magnus77840 at yahoo.com> wrote:

 Subject: Re: [ANSTHRLD] Is <clericus> a Registerable Byname
 To: "Heralds List, Kingdom of Ansteorra - SCA, Inc." <heralds at lists.ansteorra.org>
 Date: Friday, February 7, 2014, 9:01 AM
 
 It is period so that isn't the
 issue.
 
 SENA PN.4.B is the section that controls this and this name
 hasn't been ruled on.
 There is little to go on in the Laurel rulings and nothing
 found under SENA.
 
 Here are a few rulings under Rfs you can read for ideas. 
 
 
 The issues are:
 
 -presumption due to use of a locative in the name and
 
 -ordination implies claim to rank.
 
 You have to stay clear of those.
 
 Magnus
 
 
 Grimaldus the Chapelain was registered without comment March
 2010. The issue 
 
 of rank was raised and answered in commentary.
 
 
 [November 1995 LoAR, A-Caid]
 
 Dagan Cleirech. Name and device. Per pale Or and vert semy
 of shamrocks counterchanged.
 The name was submitted as Dagan Cleireach (with a typo in
 the LoI making the byname Cliereach). The two elements are
 spelled according to the conventions of different periods:
 Dagán is early, while cléireach `cleric, clerk' is
 late-period or modern. To avoid changing the given name, we
 have substituted the older form of the byname. (The modern
 form would be Daghán Cléireach.) The name is excellent:
 the epithet is even attested in just this form. (The
 documentation in the LoI, however, refers to a different
 name, the early hereditary surname Ua Cléirigh, which is
 from Cléirech as a given name.)
 
 
 
 [October 2009 LoAR, A-An Tir]
 
 Selewine sacerdos Guytherin.  Name and device. Per bend
 sinister purpure and Or, a patriarchal cross counterchanged.
 
 Submitted as Selewine Offeiriad Gwytherin, no documentation
 was provided that bynames of the type Offeiriad + <place
 name> 'priest of <place name>' were used in Welsh.
 The cited Academy of Saint Gabriel Report, #3175, only gives
 evidence
 for this pattern in Latin:
 You are right that a
 locative byname is not the best choice; during your period,
 we have
 found no examples of locative bynames which stand apart from
 a title or
 an occupation. However, among churchmen we find a wide
 variety of
 occupations and titular bynames, including the following
 Latin terms:
 [2]
 >    * episcopus (bishop)
 >    * magister (master, teacher)
 >    * doctor (probably a teacher of some
 sort)
 >    * presbiter (a religious
 functionary)
 >    * scriptor (writer, scribe)
 >    * lector (reader, lecturer)
 >    * sacerdos (priest)
 >    * abbas (abbot)
 >    * archidiaconus (archdeacon)
 >These
 titles were sometimes found in association with place names,
 e.g.
 <abbas Nant Carban>, <sacerdos Ilduit>,
 <lector
 Catoci>. [2] In the first example, <Nant Carban> is
 the name
 of a church. In the second two examples, the Latinized given
 name of
 the dedicatory saint stands in for the church. This gives us
 two
 patterns from which we could construct a byname with the
 references you
 desire.
 >Saint Gwenfrewy's name was recorded as
 <Wenefreda>
 in Latin [3,5], so <sacerdos Wenefrede> 'priest of
 Wenefreda' is
 a suitable byname following the pattern of the second two
 examples.
 (The change from <Wenfreda> [sic] to <Wenefrede>
 is again a
 change to the possessive form of the name.) In a "lives of
 the saints"
 from the early 12th century, <Gwytherin> is recorded
 in Latin as
 <Guytherin> [5], so based on this <sacerdos
 Guytherin>
 'priest of Guytherin' is also a plausible byname. [4]
 We have changed the name to Selewine sacerdos Guytherin to
 register it.
 Some
 questioned whether a byname meaning 'priest of <place
 name> or
 'priest of <saint's name>' is presumptuous. The use of
 Offeiriad is presumptuous, because it implies ordination.
 Harpy explains:
 Keep
 in mind that offeiriad (in whatever form) means specifically
 an
 ordained priest, not simply any person in religious orders.
 (The word
 comes originally from a root meaning "the person who makes
 the offering
 at mass".) If your intention is for your persona to be a
 monk, but not
 specifically a priest, then this isn't the word you want.
 The word for
 "monk" that shows up in personal names is "mynach".
 RfS VI forbids the registration of names which appear to
 make claims to powers or ranks that the submitter does not
 have. Since Offeiriad implies ordination, and we do not
 ordain people in the SCA, it is not registerable. The word
 sacerdos, on the other hand, does not have the connotation
 of ordination, so it does not violate RfS VI.1 or VI.2.
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