Sorley (given name)
Sorley is a masculine given name in the English language.
Etymology
Sorley is an Anglicised form of the Irish and Scottish Gaelic Somhairle. The Gaelic name is a form of the English Somerled, and both names are ultimately derived from the Old Norse Old Norse Sumarliðr.[1] A variant form of Sumarliðr is Sumarliði.[2] A variant form of Somerled is Summerlad, a name altered by folk etymology, derived from the words "summer" and "lad".[3] Somhairle is sometimes Anglicised as Samuel,[4] although these two names are etymologically unrelated (the latter being ultimately of Hebrew origin).[5]
The Old Norse personal name likely originated as a byname, meaning "summer-traveller",[6] "summer-warrior",[7] in reference to a Viking,[8] or men who took to raiding during the summer months as opposed to full-time raiders.[9] An early occurrence of the term is sumarliða[10] ("sumorlida", perhaps meaning "fleet"),[11] recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle under the year 871.[12] Another early occurrence of the term is Classi Somarlidiorum,[13] meaning "fleet of the sumarliðar",[14] which is recorded in the 12th-century Chronicle of the Kings of Alba, in an account of an attack on Buchan in the mid 10th century.[15] Possibly the earliest record of the personal name occurs in a grant of land in Nottinghamshire by Edgar the Peaceful in 958.[16] Several men with the name are recorded in early Icelandic sources, such as the 10th-century Hrappr Sumarliðason, and his son Sumarliði, Icelanders said to have been of Scottish and Hebridean ancestry.[17] The first historical personage in Orkney with the name was Sumarliði Sigurðsson, Earl of Orkney, eldest son of Sigurðr digri, Earl of Orkney (d. 1014).[18]
List of persons with the given name
- Somerled
- Somerled (died 1164), Lord of Argyll, King of the Hebrides and Kintyre
- Somhairle
- Somhairle Mac Domhnail, 17th-century Irish soldier
- Sorley
- Sorley Boy MacDonnell, (died 1590), Scottish/Irish chieftain
- Sorley MacLean, (1911–1996), a Scottish poet
- Sumarlidi
- Sumarlidi Sigurdsson, 11th-century Earl of Orkney
Citations
- ↑ Hanks, Hardcastle & Hodges 2006, pp. 356, 409; Hanks, & Hodges 1997, pp. ix, 230.
- ↑ Fellows-Jensen 1995, p. 400.
- ↑ Hanks, Hardcastle & Hodges 2006, p. 409; Hanks, & Hodges 1997, p. 230, 233.
- ↑ Mark 2003, p. 716.
- ↑ Hanks, Hardcastle & Hodges 2006, pp. 240–241; Hanks, & Hodges 1997, p. 220.
- ↑ Abrams 2008, pp. 183–184; Hanks, Hardcastle & Hodges 2006, pp. 356, 409; Hanks, & Hodges 1997, p. 230; Fellows-Jensen 1995, p. 398.
- ↑ McDonald & McLean 1992, pp. 5–7.
- ↑ Abrams 2008, pp. 183–184; Fellows-Jensen 1995, p. 398; McDonald & McLean 1992, pp. 5–7.
- ↑ Woolf 2007, p. 194; Fellows-Jensen 1995, p. 398.
- ↑ Woolf 2007, p. 194.
- ↑ Fellows-Jensen 1995, p. 399.
- ↑ Woolf 2007, p. 194; Fellows-Jensen 1995, p. 399.
- ↑ McDonald & McLean 1992, p. 7 n. 1; Anderson 1922, pp. 468–469.
- ↑ Woolf 2007, p. 194.
- ↑ McDonald & McLean 1992, p. 7 n. 1.
- ↑ Abrams 2008, pp. 183–184.
- ↑ Fellows-Jensen 1995, p. 399; McDonald & McLean 1992, p. 7 n. 1.
- ↑ Fellows-Jensen 1995, p. 398.
References
- Abrams, Leslie (2008), "King Edgar and the Men of the Danelaw", in Scragg, Donald, Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations, Publications of the Manchester Centre for Anglo-Saxon Studies, Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, pp. 171–191, ISBN 978-1-84383-399-4, ISSN 1478-6710.
- Anderson, Alan Orr, ed. (1922), Early Sources of Scottish History: A.D. 500 to 1286, 1, Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd.
- Fellows-Jensen, Gillian (1995), "Some Orkney Personal Names", in Batey, Colleen E.; Jesch, Judith; Morris, The Viking Age in Caithness, Orkney, and the North Atlantic, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, pp. 397–407
|first4=missing|last4=in Editors list (help). - Hanks, Patrick; Hodges, Flavia (1997), A Concise Dictionary of First Names (Revised ed.), Oxford: Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-860094-1.
- Hanks, Patrick; Hardcastle, Kate; Hodges, Flavia (2006), A Dictionary of First Names, Oxford Paperback Reference (2nd ed.), Oxford: Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-861060-1.
- Mark, Colin (2003), The Gaelic-English Dictionary, London: Routledge, ISBN 0-203-27706-6.
- McDonald, Russell Andrew; McLean, Scott A. (1992), "Somerled of Argyll: A New Look at Old Problems", The Scottish Historical Review, Edinburgh University Press, 71: 3–22, JSTOR 25530531.
- Woolf, Alex (2007), From Pictland to Alba, 789–1070, Edinburgh University Press, ISBN 978-0-7486-1233-8.