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This is a long shot, but I know of know uk equivalent of this board to ask so I'm relying on you guys.
I recently came across this very strange feminine name, Anaple, in the local cemetery. At first I thought it looked Greek, but on further research it seems to be almost entirely reserved to Ayrshire, Scotland (apart from a few instances in the Scottish borders). It's not a local place name and it doesn't look like a Gaelic, Scots or English word, so I'm intrigued as to its origin.
Ayr was a port town and I thought it could be from a foreign surname, but as a surname it appears to be very rare, and only found amoung a few Americans, which suggests it might come from Ayrshire emigrants with this as a family first name.
I also thought it might be a Scottish form of Annabel, as it is found as Anapel and Annaple, but these forms seem to be rarer than the Anaple spelling and it wouldn't explain why it is only really found in Ayrshire.
Hovoplodok-doplodovok-plovodokot-doplodokosh?
Splgraw fok fok splgrafhatchgabrlgabrl fok splfok!
Zgra kra gka fok!
~The Loch Ness Monster Song~
Edwin Morgan
I recently came across this very strange feminine name, Anaple, in the local cemetery. At first I thought it looked Greek, but on further research it seems to be almost entirely reserved to Ayrshire, Scotland (apart from a few instances in the Scottish borders). It's not a local place name and it doesn't look like a Gaelic, Scots or English word, so I'm intrigued as to its origin.
Ayr was a port town and I thought it could be from a foreign surname, but as a surname it appears to be very rare, and only found amoung a few Americans, which suggests it might come from Ayrshire emigrants with this as a family first name.
I also thought it might be a Scottish form of Annabel, as it is found as Anapel and Annaple, but these forms seem to be rarer than the Anaple spelling and it wouldn't explain why it is only really found in Ayrshire.
Splgraw fok fok splgrafhatchgabrlgabrl fok splfok!
Zgra kra gka fok!
~The Loch Ness Monster Song~
Edwin Morgan
This message was edited 4/11/2008, 3:07 AM
1
Replies
I've only encountered it as a Scottish variant of Annabel. If you don't emphasise the -bel in Annabel (it usually gets a secondary stress, and the main stress falls on the first syllable, the Ann-) then you can easily hear it as Annab'l, and from there to Annap'l is no great distance. As for the single n instead of the usual double, that makes no difference to the pronunciation so it's nor a surprising change. Annabel is originally a Scottish name, based on some long-ago person's misreading of Amabel, so there's your connection!
Very interesting to see it turn up as a surname. Thank you for that.
All the best
Very interesting to see it turn up as a surname. Thank you for that.
All the best
1
Thanks, I had thought of that but it didn't seem to fit with it being concentrated in one area of Scotland. (I edited my post just as you replied). Perhaps it's something in the Ayrshire accent, although it's not a particularly distinct one like the East Coast. Maybe a bumbling Ayrshire clerk was having a bad day and wrote Anaple instead of Anable and the parents decided they liked it!
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