In the slender thread of connection with which we try to unite names
given in the same spirit, we put together those that seem to have
accorded with the tastes of the Roman army.
Thus _eligo_ (to choose), which originally caused the title of Legion,
was in the participle _electus_, and thus led to words most familiar to
us in the state as political terms, to the theological term elect or
chosen for salvation.
There is some doubt whether St. John’s third epistle be indeed to a lady
called Electa, or to an elect lady, as it is in our version; but when a
name from this source next appears, it is among the cultivated
Gallo-Romans, when they had gradually worked their way to consideration
among the rude Franks, who had nearly trodden out civilization in the
conquered country. Eligius was the great goldsmith bishop who designed
King Dagobert’s throne, made shrines for almost all the distinguished
relics in France, and doubtless enjoyed the fame of having made many
more than could have come from his hand. He is popularly called St.
Eloy, and some derive from him the Provençal Aloys; but this is far more
probably a southern form of Hlodweh, or Louis.
The Roman veterans were termed _emeriti_ (having deserved) from _mereor_
(to deserve). From these old soldiers must have come the name
Emerentius, which is to be found as Emerenz in Germany, and Emérence in
France.
St. Emerentiana was said to have been a catechumen, who was killed by
soldiers who found her praying on the tomb of St. Agnes. Her name
(probably her relics) passed to Denmark, and to Lithuania, where it is
called Marenze, and Embrance is the old English feminine.
The very contrary, Pacifico (peaceful), is a modern Italian and Spanish
name—as Peace is Puritan.
Here, too, we place that which the soldier most esteems—_honos_, or
_honor_. Honor was a deity in later Rome, but no old classical names
were made from him, and Honorius first appears as one of the
appellations of the Spanish father of the great Theodosius; then again
inherited by that imbecile being, his grandson, the last genuine Roman
emperor; also by a niece, called Justa Grata Honoria, who dishonoured
all her three honourable names. Yet some lingering sense of allegiance
to the last great family that gave rulers to the empire perpetuated
their names in the countries where they had reigned; and the Welsh Ynyr
long remained as a relic of Honorius, in Wales. Honorine was a Neustrian
maiden, slain in a Danish invasion, and regarded as a martyr; so that
Honorine prevails in France and Germany, and one of the favourite modern
Irish names, is Onora, Honor, or in common usage, Norah.
Russia has the masculine as Gonorij; Lithuania, the feminine cut down
into Arri. There were two Gallic bishops named Honoratus, whence the
French Honoré, which has named a suburb of Paris, and we had one early
archbishop of Canterbury so called, from whom we have derived no names,
though Honor was revived in England in the days of names of abstract
qualities, and Honoria was rather in fashion in the last century,
probably as an ornamental form of the Irish Norah.[79]
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Footnote 79:
Butler; Smith, _Antiquities_; Le Beau.