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Help[Facts] Gobron, an orthodox saint's name.
Hello everyone,
In this post I will talk about the masculine given name Gobron, which I recently found on a website dedicated to Georgian given names. I had initially wanted to discuss Gobron in my previous post (the one about Aprasion), but since the text dealing with only Aprasion already turned out to be quite lengthy, I thought it wiser to discuss Gobron in a separate post. :)
According to Georgian sources, which state that the etymology and origin of this name is unknown, Gobron was the name of a martyr and saint. They say that this saint was also known as Michael, and that he was killed by Arabs in 914 AD. And indeed, it turns out that there is a Wikipedia article dedicated to this saint:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gobron
(Also see: http://oca.org/saints/lives/2013/11/17/103318-martyr-michael-gobron-of-georgia.)
The article states that his birth name was Michael, so Gobron may possibly be some kind of epithet for him that later became part of his given name. Given that the saint is of Georgian descent, 'Gobron' may well be of Georgian origin also. One has to wonder how likely that is, though, if that is true and yet Georgian sources fail to trace the name's meaning back to a medieval Georgian word. It may be more likely, then, that this name or epithet was bestowed upon the saint by a foreign force - the Arabs, or possibly the Persians or the Greeks. Maybe even the Slavs, since the name reminds me of the Polish (i.e. ultimately Slavic) word chrobry meaning "brave, valiant":
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/chrobry#Polish
I have next to no knowledge of the Arabic language, nor do I have any dictionaries for this language, so I cannot try to verify whether Gobron is possibly etymologically related to an existing Arabic word.
In my Pahlavi (i.e. Middle Persian) dictionary, I could find the following possible etymological connections:
gabr = "hollow, cavity, womb"
gabrīh = "hollowness"
gubrāg = "awake, alert, vigilant"
gubrās- = "to rouse, to awaken"
(There wasn't anything starting with gob- in there.)
It seems unlikely any of these words could have served as the base for an epithet or name. Well, with the exception of gubrāg, since that one can be interpreted in a positive way.
As for a possible Greek origin, I was able to find only the following at Perseus Digital Library: γοβρίαι (gobriai), of which the meaning is not clearly given. But apparently it is related to Greek γράβιον (grabion) meaning "torch". Either way, I can't say for certain whether this word is related to Gobron.
Well, that is all that I was able to dig up for Gobron, I'm afraid.
I'm really curious to find out more about this name, so if anyone has any possible additional information (no matter how little), I would be very interested to hear about it. Thank you in advance for your time!
Sincerely,
Lucille
In this post I will talk about the masculine given name Gobron, which I recently found on a website dedicated to Georgian given names. I had initially wanted to discuss Gobron in my previous post (the one about Aprasion), but since the text dealing with only Aprasion already turned out to be quite lengthy, I thought it wiser to discuss Gobron in a separate post. :)
According to Georgian sources, which state that the etymology and origin of this name is unknown, Gobron was the name of a martyr and saint. They say that this saint was also known as Michael, and that he was killed by Arabs in 914 AD. And indeed, it turns out that there is a Wikipedia article dedicated to this saint:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gobron
(Also see: http://oca.org/saints/lives/2013/11/17/103318-martyr-michael-gobron-of-georgia.)
The article states that his birth name was Michael, so Gobron may possibly be some kind of epithet for him that later became part of his given name. Given that the saint is of Georgian descent, 'Gobron' may well be of Georgian origin also. One has to wonder how likely that is, though, if that is true and yet Georgian sources fail to trace the name's meaning back to a medieval Georgian word. It may be more likely, then, that this name or epithet was bestowed upon the saint by a foreign force - the Arabs, or possibly the Persians or the Greeks. Maybe even the Slavs, since the name reminds me of the Polish (i.e. ultimately Slavic) word chrobry meaning "brave, valiant":
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/chrobry#Polish
I have next to no knowledge of the Arabic language, nor do I have any dictionaries for this language, so I cannot try to verify whether Gobron is possibly etymologically related to an existing Arabic word.
In my Pahlavi (i.e. Middle Persian) dictionary, I could find the following possible etymological connections:
gabr = "hollow, cavity, womb"
gabrīh = "hollowness"
gubrāg = "awake, alert, vigilant"
gubrās- = "to rouse, to awaken"
(There wasn't anything starting with gob- in there.)
It seems unlikely any of these words could have served as the base for an epithet or name. Well, with the exception of gubrāg, since that one can be interpreted in a positive way.
As for a possible Greek origin, I was able to find only the following at Perseus Digital Library: γοβρίαι (gobriai), of which the meaning is not clearly given. But apparently it is related to Greek γράβιον (grabion) meaning "torch". Either way, I can't say for certain whether this word is related to Gobron.
Well, that is all that I was able to dig up for Gobron, I'm afraid.
I'm really curious to find out more about this name, so if anyone has any possible additional information (no matter how little), I would be very interested to hear about it. Thank you in advance for your time!
Sincerely,
Lucille
This message was edited 6/25/2013, 4:08 AM
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