User:Slugabed/Reading

A collection of articles organized around personal interests and projects...

Early alphabets and symbols representing family names

I'm working on a visualization (possibly for a tattoo) of my family history based on family names, represented in early alphabets and symbols, connected to various family heritages and archeological representations of related names and words.

For both the Latin alphabet and Semitic abjads, the Phoenician alphabet was a major precursor, so I anticipate it will feature heavily in my final design.

Paternal Grandfather

My surname was Anglicized from Galician Polish 'Szymkiewicz' or 'Szymkowicz', a family-name form of Simon/Simeon.

The root of Simeon in Hebrew is "שמע", which means to hear and heed, and gives its name to the important Jewish prayer the Shema.

There are several biblical and historic people with the name Simon or Simeon, and an interesting old text specimen of the name can be found on coins from Simon bar Kokhba's Third Jewish–Roman War, which inscribed his name in Old Hebrew (Phoenician) over the Roman currency.

Paternal Grandmother

My grandmother grew up in French Morocco, and her family were Jewish Berbers (Amazigh) from the town of Ouarzazate. Her family name was Mekies or Elmekies, and her father's gravestone is inscribed with "Lmekïs". (The "L" seems to be one (French?) convention of writing the El- name prefix from Berber language – see for example fr:Maroc, "L-Meġrib".) I have not yet found a translation or meaning for the name.

Ancient Libyco-Berber inscriptions in Zagora, Morocco

There are different versions of the Berber written language Tifinagh, with some existing inscriptions of the more Eastern Taureg type. Modern Moroccan Berbers learn some Neo-Tifinagh, which is somewhat different from the ancient writing, and there seem to be fewer examples of inscriptions of ancient Western Tifinagh. The symbol from Tifinagh used on the Amazigh flag (to symbolize freedom) is ⵣ.

Because of the different uses of Tifinagh regionally and through time, and because I have no translations of the name, I don't yet know how to transcribe Elmekies, but a possiblity in more modern Neo-Tifinagh would be ⵍⵎⵇⵉⵙ.

Amazigh culture also has an old history of symbol-heavy tattoos as rites of passage for women. My grandmother's name was Etoile, French for star, and finding a symbol with a related meaning would be very appropriate for me. Berber motifs representing stars are dots and x's.

Maternal Grandfather

My grandfather grew up in Calabria, and according to and Oxford dictionary of names, the family name is based on the Southern Italian word for a huge jug of wine, carabba.

A restoration of the text on Nestor's Cup.

An archaeological find close to the region was a Euboean alphabet specimen, as discovered off the coast of Naples on the ancient literary joke-mug Nestor's Cup. This was also an important link between Phoenician, early Greek, and the Italic and modern Latin alphabet.

Maternal Grandmother

More research needed, Lithuanian.

Daughter

'Eloise' is from the root words meaning 'healthy/whole' and 'woods'...

Son

There is an early Hebrew / Phoenician rendering of his name, in a seal from the 6th Century BC...

Historic Maps

Local to Westchester County, New York City, and beyond...