Balliol
I've found that there are some Rom ("Gypies") who have the name Balliol.Would be this be close to Belial or Bailey or am I completely off base here?Any ideas?(It's male, if that's any help.)Thanks!
________________She was looking pretty, thought she owned the city. Someone should have told her that pretty ain't a job.

This message was edited 1/3/2010, 10:12 PM

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Balliol is the surname of a Norman French family that settled in northern England and southern Scotland after the Norman conquest. The surname indicates that they came from Bailleul, a place in the province of Picardy in France. One of the oldest parts of Oxford University in England is Balliol College, named after this family.http://www.crwflags.com/fotw/Flags/fr-59-ba.htmlhttp://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/50655/Balliol-familyPerhaps the name was adopted because it resembles a name in the Rom language, but the "upper class" associations of the name probably also operated in making it seem like an interesting "English" name to adopt in Rom culture.
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So would I be correct in assuming the Rom simply picked it up from the surname?I know Rom have been known to adopt names from the people of the places where they've settled or travelled though.Also, the Norman conquest was the 1000s and the Rom I found using the name were traveling through Aberdeen, Scotland in early to mid 1500s so the name could have spread by that time, right?

This message was edited 1/4/2010, 4:15 PM

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John Balliol was a King of Scotland from 1292 to 1296:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_BalliolSo it was known in Scotland.
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Wow...how did I totally not know that?
Thanks!:)
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