Sirius and Remus (More names..., Severus Snape)

[junediamanti]

No: HPFGUIDX 98202

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Geoff Bannister" 
<gbannister10 at a...> wrote:
> --- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "severelysigune" 
> <severelysigune at y...> wrote:
> 
> Potioncat:
> > << I find it interesting that Severus and Lucius are named after 
> the  
> > same person: Lucius Septimius Severus, a Roman Emperor who died 
in  
> > York.
> Sigune:
> > There were in fact several emperors who had 'Severus' in their 
> names -
> >  there was one called 'Alexander Severus' (222-235 AD), 
> one 'Flavius 
> > Valerius Severus' (306-307 AD) and even one 'Libius Severus' (461-
> 465 
> > AD, Western Empire) whose nickname was *Serpentius*!
> > 
> > Personally I can't choose between the emperor who combines both 
> > Lucius and Severus in his name, and the one who connects Severus 
> with 
> > snakes :).
> 
> Geoff:
> But have you taken into account that he is a seventh child? Has 
this 
> any bearing on our greasy-haired friend?

June:
Re names.  For those who do not know, Roman names had very precise 
structure.  Firstly they are in three parts, the "praenom" - 
equivalent to our first names, the "gens" or family name, and 
finally, for "higher ranked" Romans - the "cognomen".  

I'll stick largely to the rules that were prevalent among the Roman 
patriciate, though by the time of the Emperor Septimius Severus, the 
aristrocracy was much more homogenous and dilute due to incursions, 
internecine fighting and civil war.

Gens:  Names like Gaius, Lucius and Septimius.  Note about Septimius, 
it was very unusual by the time of that Emperor for a roman family to 
have seven sons as the cost of equipping them for a political career 
was just too expensive.  As a result, certain families had over time, 
and by tradition taken on certain "standard names" as praenomen so 
for instance if you were a partrician Julii of the gens or family 
Julii you would likely bear the praenom of Gaius or Sextus.  And not 
Sextus because you were the sixth son.  Members of the gens Cornelii -
 often Lucius.  Freed slaves also generally took the gens of the 
family that freed them, upon manumission.

Cognomina.  This was created to differentiate the various Lucius 
Corneliuses around, or the Quintus Metelluses from each other for 
example.  This was generally only needed for those "out of the loop" 
because a Roman of the governing class always knew who was being 
talked about - they all knew each other, and knew who was "in" and 
who was "out".  Cognomen fall into three main types, a sarcastic 
nickname, like Caesar - meaning "head of hair" for a family line 
dominated by men who tended to lose their hair early in life,  
honorific - usually the name of the province the original owner 
brought into the Roman Empire, eg Quintus Metellus Macedonicus for 
the conqueror of Macedonia, or Severus for a man who was considered a 
martinet by his troops.  That's how Lucius Septimius got his catchy 
last name and the gens "Septimius" (if it is a gens) tells me that 
his family were not descendants of any of the famous founding 
families of Rome.  No surprise that anyhow, because due to the 
activities of certain emperors, there were very little pure 
patricians left to become Emperor.  The army had become a way into 
the aristocracy/ruling caste by that time. As I recall, Lucius 
Septimius Severus like most emperors of that time came up via the 
army.  I also seem to recall that like many of the later Emperors his 
actual origins were not strictly Roman/Italian but that he was a 
citizen from one or other of the provinces.  That particular cognomen 
of Severus shows up earlier than this emperor, so it seems to have 
been standard as a description of a particular character.  

Of course, JKR could have any number of reasons for giving her 
character the name Severus.  "Classical" sounding names seems to be 
popular among the pureblooded (not that we know for sure Snape is 
pureblooded - it may have been that his parents were just wanabees) - 
Lucius, Regulus, Sirius, Draco all are Latin derived.  Severus and 
Snape together make a good sibilant, and Severus certainly sounds 
strict.  I suspect the main design was to just make him sound a bit 
scary for the kids.

I also hope she didn't take longer than five minutes thinking up his 
name, because generally (in fanfic at least), taking longer than five 
minutes to come up with the name of a character is a classic 
Mary/Gary Sue/Stu indicator...

June