Thralls’ Names in Scandinavia

2021 ◽  
pp. 211-218
Author(s):  
Stefan Brink
Keyword(s):  
Historical Background ◽  
Old Norse ◽  
Male And Female ◽  
Personal Names ◽  
Old Norse Literature ◽  
The Will ◽  
Freed Slaves ◽  
Female Slaves ◽  
Free People ◽  
Large Corpus

Thanks to the Old Norse literature we have an large corpus of slave names to consider. When analysing these names, we arrive at the unfortunate conclusion that in many (most?) cases these names look like fictious, generative names, created to fit with the thrall topoi in the narrative. This is evident in the enumeration of thrall names in the poem Rígsþula, where all the names for male and female slaves are highly derogatory, obviously to make a statement of these unfree people being firmly at the bottom of society and to be looked upon with contempt. There are some names on slaves which have an origin in Celtic language, which are interesting, and some probably have a historical background. In the will of freed slaves, mentioned before, all former slaves have ordinary personal names that we find among free people. This raises the question if freed slaves took or were given a new, proper and Christian name at the manumission.

scholarly journals A Sociolinguistic Study of Choosing Names for Newborn Children in Jordan

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 177 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abeer Harb Al-Qawasmi ◽  
Fawwaz Al-Abed Al-Haq
Keyword(s):  
Random Sample ◽  
Social Values ◽  
Male And Female ◽  
Personal Names ◽  
The People ◽  
Time Period ◽  
Civil Status ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Different Cultures ◽  
Clear Change

<p>This study aims at the study of newborn names in Jordan of a sociolinguistic perspective. This study tries to detect the difference in naming newborns in Jordan over the decades - from the seventies to 2015 due to the result of some factors that may have affected the Jordanian society, whether historical, religious and/or social. The data necessary to complete the study was obtained from the Civil Status Department and the Department of Statistics. The data obtained consisted of names of both sexes during the time period from the seventies until the early year of 2015, a random sample of personal names within the same family were also provided. The data was analyzed quantitatively. The study revealed that there is a clear change in the choice of newborn names-male and female-in Jordan, whether a change in sounds or in morphemes. In specific, names during the seventies were strongly linked to the culture and the values, religious or social, in which the people believed in. During the eighties and nineties, names were associated with certain social values, however, some names were shown to be affected by urbanization or modernization. And with the beginning of 2000 up to 2015, peoples directions towards naming newborns changed due to the advent of globalization, associating with development and urbanization, and moreover, the influence of different cultures on the community.</p>

The ‘Whole Humanity’: Gregory of Nyssa's Critique of Slavery in Light of His Eschatology

2001 ◽  
Vol 54 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Bentley Hart
Keyword(s):  
Domestic Economy ◽  
Ancient Text ◽  
Male And Female ◽  
Common Life ◽  
Chattel Slavery ◽  
John Chrysostom ◽  
Female Slaves ◽  
The Church

Nowhere in the literary remains of antiquity is there another document quite comparable to Gregory of Nyssa's fourth homily on the book of Ecclesiastes: certainly no other ancient text still known to us—Christian, Jewish, or Pagan—contains so fierce, unequivocal, and indignant a condemnation of the institution of slavery. Not that it constitutes a particularly lengthy treatise: it is only a part of the sermon itself, a brief exegedeal excursus on Ecclesiastes 2:7 (‘I got me male and female slaves, and had my home-born slaves as well’), but it is a passage of remarkable rhetorical intensity. In it Gregory treats slavery not as a luxury that should be indulged in only temperately (as might an Epicurean), nor as a necessary domestic economy too often abused by arrogant or brutal slave-owners (as might a Stoic like Seneca or a Christian like John Chrysostom), but as intrinsically sinful, opposed to God's actions in creation, salvation, and the church, and essentially incompatible with the Gospel. Of course, in an age when an economy sustained otherwise than by chattel slavery was all but unimaginable, the question of abolition was simply never raised, and so the apparent uniqueness of Gregory's sermon is, in one sense, entirely unsurprising. Gregory lived at a time, after all, when the response of Christian theologians to slavery ranged from—at best—resigned acceptance to—at worst—vigorous advocacy. But, then, this makes all the more perplexing the question of how one is to account for Gregory's eccentricity. Various influences on his thinking could of course be cited— most notably, perhaps, that of his revered teacher and sister Macrina, who had prevailed upon Gregory's mother to live a common life with her servants—but this could at best help to explain only Gregory's general distaste for the institution; it would still not account for the sheer uncompromising vehemence of his denunciations.

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