The Name
The Artist Formerly Known As Jan has come up with a name: Morwenna de Bonnay.
Morwenna is listed on the Problem Names Project, because (quoting a pending article provided by Lady Aryanhwy merch Catmael):
Morwen or Morwenna is Cornish and Welsh, the name of an early virgin saint; the Cornish parish of Morwenstow is named after her. … As Morwenna the name has been used in modern times in Cornwall; we are not sure how early it was used, but two sources imply that it dates from the Middle Ages. However, we have no early citations of the name in connection with a demonstrably historical person, and the actual etymology of the name is obscure.
That is to say: there’s a saint named Morwenna, but no evidence of a real person of that name. The Catholic Church used to make up saints by, in some cases, ripping off the names of local deities and legendary heroes. Perhaps Morwenna was one such import.
So it’s not a good recreation of period practice, since there was (to the best of our knowledge) nobody by that name in period. But all is not lost! The SCA has a loophole: if the name was applied to a saint in period, then we can use it, even if the saint was probably legendary and nobody else used the same name. So Morwenna is perfectly SCA Compatible, and since Jan wants it, Jan can have it.
As for the byname: Jan originally wanted to go with Du Bonney, but the grammar is wrong: “du” is French for “of the”, but that only gets used in names like “du Lac” (“of the lake”). A bonney is not a place, so it should be de Bonney instead. Except that we couldn’t find anywhere named Bonney, so we went with de Bonnay, which I found dated to 1421 in Aryanhwy merch Catmael’s French Surnames from Paris, 1421, 1423 & 1438.
The Device
Morwenna likes the idea of an owl, possibly clutching an emerald, and the colours purple and yellow. Her earlier try conflicted with an existing design. But after a discussion with some heralds, I found that a very simple design is available. There are two options, thus:
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| Purpure, three owls Or | Purpure, three owls Or each maintaining an emerald vert |
These are both clear of conflict. The one on the left is better style – in fact, it’s excellent – but the one on the right is almost as good. It’s up to Morwenna to decide what she wants… and after a quick discussion, she’s made what I consider to be the better decision: she wants the one on the left. Win!
Both the name and the device were registered in September 2012. The device got a coveted “nice!” comment from Laurel, which is always, well, nice.