GEN-MEDIEVAL-L Archives

Subject: Re: Old Norse for "Grandson"?
Date: 9 Jun 1995 03:23:13 GMT

In <> (Matt Stum (SCA: Gwydion ap
Myrddin)) writes:

>This is only vaguely genealogically related, but...

>Did the Norse/Icelandic/etc. names ever reflect that someone was someone's
>grandson? You see a lot of names indicating that someone is somone's
>son, but I've had a request to find the term for "grandson".

>My initial uneducated guess is to just double the suffix: -sonson

>Thanx!

Old Norse had no blanket term for "grandson". There was (and is in modern
Icelandic) "sonarsonr" and "dttursonr" (doottursonr, if you haven't got
8-bits working)

There would of course be no "avonym" instead of a patronym, but a typical
designation of descent would be "Elas Halldr gstsson er sonur gstar
Halldrs Elassonar, Halldrssonar, Halldrssonar, Gumundssonar,
Jnssonar, rarsonar ..."

which translates as: "EHA is the son of AHE, of the son of Halldor, of
the son of Halldor, of the son of Gudmundur, of the son of Jon, of the
son of Thordur ..."

and translates as (line): Elias Halldor Agustsson, Agust Halldor Eliasson,
Elias Halldorsson, Halldor Halldorsson, Halldor Gudmundsson, Gudmundur
Jonsson, Jon Thordarson

a little strange at first, but read a few sagas (Orkneyinga Saga is
probably best for European Royalty fans ... Heimskringla is also very
interesting ...



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