Predatory Nomenclature and Dynastic Expansion in Early Medieval Wales

OpenAlex · İngilizce

This paper examines the "naming strategy" of the Second Dynasty of Gwynedd which dominated Welsh politics during the ninth and tenth centuries.It is argued that as the dynasty established itself in Gwynedd and then expanded its power through most of Wales, it adopted the personal names characteristic ofthe various earlier dynasties which it had replaced, perhaps to support onomastically this political expansion.Furthermore, when the dynasty became segmented into two main branches during the tenth century, it seems that the northern branch tended to employ personal names associated with earlier northern dynasties, and the southern branch those associated with the south.Names are the very stuff of prosopography: without a knowledge of anthro-