The Merovingian Practice of Naming after Relatives: Family Traditions and Politics. – The name-giving habits in the Early Middle Ages are often connected with the traditions of a kin group. But the Merovingian example shows the importance of politics: During the course of its existence the Merovingian Frankish Kingdom was often separated into Teilreiche. Their kings were closely related which led to a claim to succeed one another. This is the context of the beginning of the Merovingian naming after relatives. Giving a name which was a popular part of the tradition of another Teilreich was a means to express one’s political claim on said kingdom. It is interesting that Clothar I – the weakest king of his generation – used this instrument most frequently. As did his son Chilperic I who at first also was at a disadvantage compared to his half-brothers. Chilperich even used the name Merowech which shows his ambition to rule the Gesamtreich, at least around Clothar’s I death in 561. Naming after a direct ancestor (especially after the grandfather) was comparatively seldom. Maybe because naming generally did not serve as stabilisation of a family tradition (as in later centuries) but current political concerns. In the 7th century the naming after direct ancestors or relatives prevailed.

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Where are the Lombards in the Italian Charters? Identity, Kinship and Name-giving. — Questions of identity, kinship and name-giving arise in the Italian charters of the early Middle Ages. Beginning in the 1990’s, the group “Nomen et Gens” has intensively engaged in the question of a relationship between ethnic identity and the choice of a personal name in Late Antiquity and in the Middle Ages. Owing to their nature the Italian private charters are a great source for a micro-history of personal names. Even if it is not always possible to determine that personal names are a marker of ethnic identity, the charters show that their historical significance is not only based on their ethnic relevance. The Lombard and Latin names give evidence to other forms of identity. The original private charters were entrenched in the place where they originated and they are therefore a source into inquiry of local identities. For instance, local features in personal names emerge in the comparison of the name of a bishop of Luni, Teudilascius (*theudho- + *laika-z), which is typical in Tuscanian charters, and the name Teudelais from Piacenza in the North of Italy. The Italian charters are “family charters” and this allows us to draw conclusions about name-giving. On the basis of the genealogy of Bishop Peredeo of Lucca this contribution analyses also the use of traditional forms of name-​giving (allitteration, repitition, variation) showing that such rules are applied not only to Lombard names but also to Latin-Christian names. Moreover, the semantics of Peredeo’s genealogy lead back to the vocation of his family. It is the vocation of a Lombard family to ecclesiastic power.

Development of Names and Name-Giving in Upper and Lower Classes in Early Ninth-Century Île-de-France. – This onomastic article about names and name giving intends to demonstrate possible cooperations between philologists and historians. The rich material of personal names in the polyptych of Saint-Germain-des-Prés near Paris from the early ninth century, on the one hand, allows an interesting philological analysis of the morphology, phonetics and lexicology of names in a region of previously intensive ‘Germanic’ and Gallo-Roman acculturation. On the other hand, it permits an analysis of different motives of name giving, particularly the familial transmission of names or of their elements to the children as well as the use of Christian names. It is further interesting to compare these peasant names with those of the upper classes. As a kind of test drilling, this article is based on an analysis of four fisci of the polyptych (Palaiseau, Villemeux, Villeneuve, Béconcelle), compared with the names of monks, donors and witnesses of the same period and region. Considering the processes that a language runs through in a situation of continuous bilinguism, the names reveal a broad spectrum of Romanization (phonetic and morphological assimilation) as well as of hybrid names with Germanic and Romance elements or suffixes, as far as forming new name elements by an etymologically ‘false’ segmentation. Although this development is generally observed in all social classes, certain phenomena, such as spirantization of stops, coupling Romance suffixes with Germanic elements, or the formation of names by constructing new elements, are much more common among the peasants. Concerning name giving, the whole spectrum of traditional forms of ‘inheriting’ the whole name of one parent or one element of both the paternal or maternal name (‘variation’), in various combinations, seems to be complemented by further forms, such as alliteration or ‘rhyme’, but also by using different, and new, kinds of variation, namely either slight phonetical variations of the same name or by using different, but phonetically similar lemmata. The ‘Romanized’ forms as a linguistic development are frequently integrated into this ‘system’ of name giving in order to differentiate between the namebearers. While a ‘Romanization’ of non- Romance names is well under way, the ‘Christianization’ of names is still in its initial stages. In the Paris area, ‘Christian’, particularly biblical names are more common among monks and clerics than among peasants, who, however, use the whole spectrum (biblical, ‘talking names’, names composed with Crist-, names of saints), frequently prefer variations of biblical names and combine them with other elements. From a functional and pragmatic perspective, Romance and Christian names are used like and adapted to names of etymologically Germanic origin, while the linguistic principles of name-formation are maintained and the Romance and Germanic onomastic morphology still coexist.