[HPforGrownups] Arabella Origin = Latin orabilis.

[GulPlum]

No: HPFGUIDX 44305

At 13:35 21/09/02 -0400, Eloise wrote:

<snip>

>I have to say that 'orabilis', although quite possible, seems to me the
>weakest candidate, given the historical weight in favour of the amabile ->
>Amabel -> Arabel -> Arabella route and the prevalence of 'bella', as in
>'beautiful' as a suffix for girls' names.

I went through a several hard-copy books in the library today (sorry, I 
didn't note titles), both general etymology and onomastikons, and they were 
pretty evenly divided on amabile/ara bella derivations (with a small 
penchant for the latter, much to my relief).  :-)

I must say that none of them went via orabilis. Incidentally, note the 
"perhaps" on the site Steve quoted (before anyone accuses me of shouting at 
Steve, yes, he *did* quote the word in his post).  VERY curiously, a couple 
of books even went as far as deriving the separate name "Orabel" from "ara 
bella", NOT from "orabilis", which I find a bit strange.

Some took "ara bella" from Greek rather than Latin, which is perfectly 
valid. A couple of observations, though: Greek "ara" started off as 
"prayer" (so, there *is* a possible connection with "orabilis after all!) 
and "altar" (i.e. "place of supplication") is only a derived meaning. Also, 
AFAIR, perhaps interestingly for the Potterverse, it did NOT pick up the 
further related meaning it did in Latin of "place of safety".

I'd completely forgotten about the possible Greek connection, so I went a 
bit further. News to me at the time, and perhaps VERY interestingly for the 
Potterverse, is why the constellation of Ara is so named (it's all about 
the fight between the gods and the Titans (i.e. giants!); good summary 
(despite a few typos) here:

http://home.earthlink.net/~kjblackford/ara.html

Food for thought, or not? Am I reading *far* too much into JKR's Greek 
mythology connections, or not?