Username meme
Tagged by the lovely swankkat:
Rule: Post the explanation of where your username came from. Then tag TEN users whose explanations you'd like to hear. If you are tagged post the explanation to your page.
For about 10 years, I was part of the SCA - the Society for Creative Anachronism. It's a world-wide group that does living history-ish stuff from the Middle Ages and Renaissance. I left for a lot of reasons, not least of which was a boyfriend who broke up with me and not only broke my heart, but ripped it into shreds, stomped on it, and poured a vat of lemon juice over it to boot. Not surprisingly, I left the group because 1. I couldn't deal with other people for awhile, and 2. he was a member. Dunno if he still is; it's been 5 years.
Anyway, in the SCA, I spent some time searching around to find the persona I wanted. I decided at first I wanted a Tudor persona, but it soon became clear to me that in order to do Tudor garb right, you need two of the following three things: money, time, and skill. I was in college, so I had none of them. Not long after this realisation, I was talking with a friend and discovered the wonderfulness that is the T-tunic, and decided I was going early period because it was easier and cheaper to make decent-looking garb. Since I've always been fascinated with Scotland (I'm actually descended from 3 Scottish clans: MacKenzie, MacLeod, and Buchanan), I decided I wanted an early-period Celtic persona. I picked a name I liked--Aislinn (which is now the name of zoanthropic and bryonyraven's daughter, bar the second N! Though not because I'd ever used it)--and started using that while I researched a name.
Come to find out, Aislinn is actually a 19th-century name. Unusable. Well, unregisterable, at least. So I inquired of the College of St Giles what might be close, and they came up with Aibhinn, which they said in the 12th century would have been pronounced, roughly, yEEF-vynn, where the first Y is only barely pronounced and the second syllable rhymes with "win". And so I decided I could be *called* Aislinn, register as Aibhinn, and make it all good! I even came up with the patronymic; my full name was Aibhinn ingen Mael Eoin mhic Dhomnaill (yEEF-vynn EEN-yen mal YOAN-yeh vec DHOV-nall). Aibhinn, the daughter of John, who was the son of Donnell. (Actually, according to the College of St Giles, twelfth-century Scots didn't name themselves after saints directly; they called themselves 'the servant of ____' instead. So "Mael Eoin" translates to "the servant of John", meaning St John the Evangelist.) Of course, about the time I decided to register this, and had a device to register as well (a "coat of arms," except I hadn't been granted an Award of Arms yet), I left--so none of this is official in the SCA.
Anyway, about eight or nine months after I left the SCA, I started venturing back online, and found a link to a Harry Potter fanfic story called "Naked Quidditch Match." It was on the now-defunct Gryffindor Tower, and I was HOOKED. It was through my involvement with HP that I found my way to Livejournal--and what better username to pick than the one I'd been writing fanfic under? I'd chosen Aibhinn because I couldn't think of a better one... but soon I decided I liked it and wanted to keep it. But I still have myself listed as "She of the Unpronounceable Name." buckbeakbabie, who's Irish, has told me she pronounces it AY-vynn, where the first syllable rhymes with "play" and the second rhymes with "win". That's my current pronunciation of it, 12th-century Scottish name or no. :)
If you waded through all that, kudos to you! I think I need to go rest my fingers. (Or work on Reunited chapter 5....) :D
Rule: Post the explanation of where your username came from. Then tag TEN users whose explanations you'd like to hear. If you are tagged post the explanation to your page.
For about 10 years, I was part of the SCA - the Society for Creative Anachronism. It's a world-wide group that does living history-ish stuff from the Middle Ages and Renaissance. I left for a lot of reasons, not least of which was a boyfriend who broke up with me and not only broke my heart, but ripped it into shreds, stomped on it, and poured a vat of lemon juice over it to boot. Not surprisingly, I left the group because 1. I couldn't deal with other people for awhile, and 2. he was a member. Dunno if he still is; it's been 5 years.
Anyway, in the SCA, I spent some time searching around to find the persona I wanted. I decided at first I wanted a Tudor persona, but it soon became clear to me that in order to do Tudor garb right, you need two of the following three things: money, time, and skill. I was in college, so I had none of them. Not long after this realisation, I was talking with a friend and discovered the wonderfulness that is the T-tunic, and decided I was going early period because it was easier and cheaper to make decent-looking garb. Since I've always been fascinated with Scotland (I'm actually descended from 3 Scottish clans: MacKenzie, MacLeod, and Buchanan), I decided I wanted an early-period Celtic persona. I picked a name I liked--Aislinn (which is now the name of zoanthropic and bryonyraven's daughter, bar the second N! Though not because I'd ever used it)--and started using that while I researched a name.
Come to find out, Aislinn is actually a 19th-century name. Unusable. Well, unregisterable, at least. So I inquired of the College of St Giles what might be close, and they came up with Aibhinn, which they said in the 12th century would have been pronounced, roughly, yEEF-vynn, where the first Y is only barely pronounced and the second syllable rhymes with "win". And so I decided I could be *called* Aislinn, register as Aibhinn, and make it all good! I even came up with the patronymic; my full name was Aibhinn ingen Mael Eoin mhic Dhomnaill (yEEF-vynn EEN-yen mal YOAN-yeh vec DHOV-nall). Aibhinn, the daughter of John, who was the son of Donnell. (Actually, according to the College of St Giles, twelfth-century Scots didn't name themselves after saints directly; they called themselves 'the servant of ____' instead. So "Mael Eoin" translates to "the servant of John", meaning St John the Evangelist.) Of course, about the time I decided to register this, and had a device to register as well (a "coat of arms," except I hadn't been granted an Award of Arms yet), I left--so none of this is official in the SCA.
Anyway, about eight or nine months after I left the SCA, I started venturing back online, and found a link to a Harry Potter fanfic story called "Naked Quidditch Match." It was on the now-defunct Gryffindor Tower, and I was HOOKED. It was through my involvement with HP that I found my way to Livejournal--and what better username to pick than the one I'd been writing fanfic under? I'd chosen Aibhinn because I couldn't think of a better one... but soon I decided I liked it and wanted to keep it. But I still have myself listed as "She of the Unpronounceable Name." buckbeakbabie, who's Irish, has told me she pronounces it AY-vynn, where the first syllable rhymes with "play" and the second rhymes with "win". That's my current pronunciation of it, 12th-century Scottish name or no. :)
If you waded through all that, kudos to you! I think I need to go rest my fingers. (Or work on Reunited chapter 5....) :D