In which I reveal the fruits of my cunning procrastination techniques

[amari_z]

I have been musing over a few King Arthur drabbles lately and it has occurred to me that "Lancelot" is an exceedingly silly name (especially for someone from Sarmatia, but let's not even go there). I've been reading King Arthur stories since I was old enough to have my own library card (The Boy's King Arthur—how sexist was that? It was perfectly good enough for a girl), and I do occasionally wonder, what the hell kind of name is Lancelot? (Or "Launcelot" if you prefer.)

A little internet is a dangerous thing. According to a baby names website, Lancelot is from old French (which makes sense if you look at the literary history and not crackbrained "true" theories, which although fun, can on reflection induce screaming outrage) and means "servant." How amusing. I could do something with that, provided I ignore the old French part. Another baby names website says the meaning is "attendant" but that's not quite as fun.

But another website on name etymology states: "Meaning unknown, possibly an Old French pet form of Lanzo," which in turn is "a short form of names that began with the element meaning 'land.'" This seems plausible, considering the German story Lanzelet.

Wikipedia tells us that: "The name Lancelot is not obviously Celtic, though attempts have been made to find a possible Celtic origin that might have been corrupted into Lancelot (such as 'Lance ap Lot,' meaning Lance, son of Lot)." This is intriguing, if far fetched, because it could make Lancelot the brother of Gawain & Co. (and don't forget Co. includes Mordred, if the mother is the same). That could make a weird kind of sense, if you make a mishmash of various versions of the legend for your own amusement, considering that in Lanzelet, or some other early version, Lancelot's mother is actually Arthur’s sister, and, even in the early prose versions, Lancelot is a lot younger than both Arthur and Guinevere and is actually born after they are married.

In other random, but somehow vaguely amusing, factoids, the Italian derivations of Lancelot include Lancellotta, Lancellotto, and Lancellotti and Ancilotto. A French feminine form of the name is Ancelin, and means spear attendant.


From all this you’d think I was a creature of excess leisure, but in fact I’m only very good at procrastinating. I’m actually at work so I suppose I should go make an attempt at working now.

Comments

[sasha-b.livejournal.com]

This made me laugh - I was browsing your journal and had to read. It is a rather silly name for a Sarmatian - but then again, we have to have the legend. :p

And Ancelin? Sounds like a brand of aspirin. :p

Thanks for the laugh.

[amari-z.livejournal.com]

Welcome, and I'm happy you enjoyed. I was amusing myself here (a near constant preoccupation), so I'm glad to spread it around.

I have been giggling to myself as I think back to all the old stories--the whole knight in the cart is thing is begging for a fic, Bors being Lancelot's cousin, Galahad being Lancelot's Christian (ha!) name (along with the name of his son), the possibilities for silliness are nearly endless--or at least I'm not bored yet.