Monday, May 2, 2011

On the Meanings of the Dolls' Names

The court:
-Lir- A name of a sea deity and several kings historical and mythic.
-Rowena- Used/possibly coined by Sir Walter Scott for the lovely Saxon love interest/heroine in "Ivanhoe".
-Mathonwy- A king in a Welsh myth I read. I decided the name was awesome and needed to go to a character of mine, someone with gravitas.
-Winter- what it sounds like, a nickname acquired from his silver hair and charming temperament. His real given name is Aeron, which is said roughly as EYE-ron. It's Welsh too. Apparently in Welsh mythology Aeron was often portrayed as a masculine deity of some kind or another. It might mean "Berry".
-Donovan- According to "Behind the Name", The given name Donndubhán is made of the Gaelic element donn "brown" combined with dubh "dark" and a diminutive suffix. So, little dark brown [guy]. Sorta. Not very descriptive, as my character Don is neither dark, brown, nor has he been little since he was wee.
-Malcolm- From the Gaelic Mael Colum, servant of Colum. Again, this has no bearing on the character.
-Elinore- Whoo boy. From "Behind the Name": From the Old French form of the Provençal name Aliénor. It was first borne by the influential Eleanor of Aquitaine. She was named Aenor after her mother, and was called by the Provençal phrase alia Aenor "the other AENOR" in order to distinguish her from her mother.
-Siofra- One of the Gaelic words for Fairy.
-Tiarnach- from Irish Gaelic tigern, meaning "lord".
-Kevya- means No One or Nobody in a Constructed Language of mine. Story reasons for this.

Not part of the Court:
Copernica: I feminized the Latin name Copernicus. Original meaning has something to do with goat horns, I'm sure. My intent was referencing the astronomer by the name.
Stella- Star. Like twinkle twinkle.
Apple- Well duh.
Pip- a seed, very small, as of a grape. Fitting, since she was the first Tiny sized doll I got.
Nikos- A pet form of Nikolas or Nikolaos, which is from Greek νικη (nike) "victory" and λαος (laos) "people". Victors, or victorious people?
Sorrel- a woodland plant, looks shamrocky. Also a color of horse, a burnished brown.
Timmany- She insisted this was her name. I'm not gonna argue with a jet-lagged fairy.

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