Real Names·world·male

Male Anglo-Saxon Names

Every cue below is locked to male anglo-saxon names. Old English names from before the Norman conquest, woven from words for battle, counsel and joy, worthy of thanes and abbesses alike.

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Want the full range? Browse all anglo-saxon names or cue female anglo-saxon names instead.

About male anglo-saxon names

How male anglo-saxon names are built

A male draw pulls from an 881-entry forename bank and a female draw from a 428-entry bank, then templates add a byname slot. Patterns include a bare name, an epithet (the name plus "the" and an occupation word), a plain occupational surname (the same trade word attached without the article), and a place-of-origin form where a stem and a tail from two fragment banks join into one coined locative after "of".

  • Deorwulf the Falconer

    Deorwulf + Falconer

    forename plus an epithet from the byname bank

  • Hereswitha Skinner

    Hereswitha + Skinner

    female forename with the trade word attached bare, no article

  • Osbeald of Tillybaan

    Osbeald + Tilly + baan

    forename plus a two-part place glued from a stem and a tail

Naming notes

The forename banks are the large slots, so the given name varies far more than the byname pool. The byname templates wire three shapes onto a name: an occupational epithet from a 208-entry bank set after "the", the same trade word attached bare with no article, and a two-part place built by gluing a stem (189 entries) to a tail (83). The bare-name pattern returns the forename alone. Use the "the"-epithet form for a chronicle register and the bare name for casual reference.

Questions about male anglo-saxon names

Why do some results add 'the Falconer' or a bare trade word?
Those are byname templates: one appends an occupational epithet after 'the', one attaches the trade word bare, as in Acca Miller, and one builds a place of origin by gluing a stem to a tail. A bare-name pattern returns the forename alone.
Where do the place-of-origin names come from?
The 'of' pattern joins two fragment banks, a 189-entry stem and an 83-entry tail, into a single coined locative such as Tilly plus baan giving Tillybaan.
How large are the forename banks?
The male forename bank holds 881 entries and the female bank 428, so the forename carries most of the variation against the smaller byname slots.