Message: "Isabeau" - Behind the Name

Isabeau

by katja (guest)

9/5/2004, 1:29 AM

Is Isabeau old french or is it something else?

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- Stefaan Huysentruyt (guest) +1

10/6/2004, 10:34 AM

In a historic french series of comic strips "Les passagers du vent" the main character is a young woman named Isabeau, XVIIIth century
http://www.art9.net/historique/xviiie_siecle/passagers_du_vent_les/l_esclavage_traite_par_bourgeon_article207.html

- Izabeau Trottier (guest)

10/14/2004, 6:16 PM

Meaning gift from god, musical, elegant, exotique.vary big she will be by her talent and her work.

I looked it up for a project, I should know,its my name.

- Elinor (guest)

9/7/2004, 11:49 AM

Devonelisa, when she was here, gave me this which I saved:

"Isabeau is feminine, an older French variant of Isabel/Isabelle. Belle and Beau are incidental, not really the connection, it's a diminutive form, -eau being a standard diminutive formation of the time."

- lala +3

9/5/2004, 9:59 AM

Isabeau is most likely Freanch (the Beau part) and is often used as a pet form of Isabelle to say "beautiful Isabelle". There are records of Henry VIII calling his daughter Princess Elizabeth "dear Ysabeau". So it has something to that effect.

Lala

- Menke (guest) +2

9/5/2004, 10:27 AM

but that would be very strange as BEAU is male
BELLE would be more logical

- Kat (guest) +1

9/5/2004, 1:33 PM

Thinking that "beau" or "belle" is part of the name is wrong. The ending is "eau" or "elle" tacked onto Isab- and has nothing to do with gender, they're both just diminutives.

- Miss Claire

9/5/2004, 3:14 PM

True, although very often -elle is feminine and -eau masculine.

- Menke (guest) +2

9/5/2004, 7:52 AM

isabeau is an opposit of isabelle
belle is the female form of beau
as Isabelle is a female name Isabeau (if it is a name) has to be a male name, but i never heard of it so im not sure if it exists

- Miss Claire +1

9/5/2004, 11:07 AM

French here!

The name Isabeau does exist, although it's very rare nowadays.
I'm sorry, but it's not the male form of Isabelle. Isabeau is the Old French for Isabelle. It has nothing to do with Belle.
In Old French, some feminine names ended in "male" ways: Isabeau, Mahaut, Brunehaut, Marion, Berthe, Alix, Margot / Margaux... because Old French was a more Germanic, less Roman language.

- Stefaan Huysentruyt (guest)

10/6/2004, 10:47 AM

Ik you lookup with google for Isabeau and Québec and généalogie you'd be surprised howmany mothers were called Isabeau from the seventeenth century on...

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