The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1882-12-09
Edgar, Edmund, Edward.

The word Edgar, originally Eadgar,
may be ROUGHLY translated as equivalent
to Noble Spear, or perhaps rather Spear
noble, or Noble Spearman; for exactly
to render it in modern English would be
as difficult as exactly to render SOphocles
or AnaXagOras. 1t is thus true old
English name, composed entirely of En-
glish elements, without any foreign adj
mixture whatever. And now the ques-
ton arises. How does a modern En-
glishman come to bear this truely En-
gIish name? We know that Immediate
ly after the Norman conquest almost all
our original Christian names went sud
denly out of fashion; and that every
GOdric or Wulfsi9 in the land began to
call his children after the Williams,
Walters, Roberts, Rogers, Ralphs and
Richards who had come over in the train
of the Conqueror. Most of these new
tangled forms Gas have before pointed
OUT were Old High German, taken into
Gaul by the Franks, corrupted on the
lips by the Celtic Neustrian peasantry.
and further degraded by the Scandina-
Wan settlers in Normandy. A few,
however, like Arthur, Owen and Alan,
were Breton Welsh. At the same time,
the new lords of English manors also in
troduced q number of Scriptural names,
such as Johan or John, Thomas, Simon,
Stephen, Piers or Peter, James and
Matthew. The new names wholly
crushed out the Ethelreds and ELF
wards of pre-Norman days. az well as
the once fashionable Harolds, Swegens.
Olafs and Erics, which the English had
borrowed from their Danish lords; so
that when we think nowadays of me-
diaval England Guy and Gilbert, Hugh
and Godfrey, Wat and Perkid, not bud
da or IElfstan, are the Typical sounds
that rise instinctively to our lips. There
were only two genuine English forms
that really survived the great revolution
in nomenclature of the eleventh CEN
tury. Those names were Eadward
and Eadmund; and they owed
their continued existence entirely to
the personal favor of Henry III.
That superstitious and futile Angevin
took it into his head to venerate above
all other saints the only two sanity, or
half-saintly English Kings, doubtless be-
cause he hoped, after his craven fashion,
to be canonized and worshiped in his
turn as they We're. q don't often find
myself in the same boat with Mr.. Free
man, but confess to Il personal animos-
ity against Henry lid Well, tofurther
this sanctimOnious scheme, Henry pulled
down the great abbey of Edward the
ConfessOr ut Westminster and rebuilt in
its place the noble church that we all
know so well; and in it he placed the
shrine of Edward. as he hoped some
other King would hereafter place a
shrine to his own saintship; also, he
called his oldest son, Edward l., by the
Confessor's name, while his second son,
Edward Crouchback, Earl of Lancaster,
was christened in honor of st. Edmund
of East Anglia, the local under King of
Norfolk and Suffolk, who was killed by
the Danes during the first heather inva-
sion, and was accounted ever after as the
patron saint of the eastern counties. with
his great shrine at Bury st. Edmunds.
These are the first two instances, and
almost the only instances | know, where
men of Norman or Angevin descent were
ever called by native English names. The
royal example, however, soon proved
contagious; and when once Edward and
Edmund were recognized as forming
part of the regular dynastic list, they
soon spread down again to all classes of
people. Throughout the whole of the
middle ages they were the only two liv-
ing English names; even Alfred and Ed
win, now SO common, having become
temporarily obsolete. As a proof we
may all see that Edwards and Edmunds
are familiar surnames, but nobody ever
met with an Alfreds or an Edwins. The
first two were ordinary Christian names
during the age when surnames were be-
ing fixed, and SO they gave rise to pat
ronymies; but the last two were then
practically dead, and so they never
brought forth a iilial form. -CoynhU
Magazine.