These names may be regarded as deriving from pre- or proto-historical dynastic legend, originally preserved in Old English genealogical poetry. Some of the names are alliteratively grouped, and may refer to different origin-myths. The possible meaning of some of the names is suggested.
- 1. Woden – ancestral father-god of all the Old English royal families
- 2. Caser – “Kaiser” or “Caesar”, symbolically filiated to Woden
- 3. Tyttman
- 4. Trygil – ‘Little Boat’?
- 5. Hróðmund – identifiable as Hróðmund, prince of Denmark in Beowulf (See Chapter 4 of my book)
- 6. Hryp
- 7. Wilhelm – ‘Wolf-Helm’
- 8. Wehha – “first to rule over the East Anglian folk in Britain” (Historia Brittonum, 59)
- 9. Wuffa – ‘Little Wolf’; “from whom East Anglian kings were thenceforth named Wuffings” (Bede, HE, II, 15)
© Copyright Dr Sam Newton AD 2014