‘Number names’ seem to be a bit of an in thing at the moment, what with the recent celebrity arrivals, Harper Seven Beckham and Aleph Portman-Millepied. So this weeks Nook of Names Pick of the Week is a variation on the theme… or is it?
There is no denying that una is the feminine form of the Latin unus ‘one’ — both unus and one derive from the same Proto-Indo-European source, along with the German ein(e), Greek enas, Old Irish óen and Welsh un.
Unus also means ‘a single’ and ‘alone’.
As a name, this Una (traditionally pronounced ‘YOO-nuh’) first appears in Edmund Spenser’s epic allegorical masterpiece The Faerie Queene — written in the late 16th Century in praise of Queen Elizabeth I.
Una — essentially ‘the One and Only’ — stands for the Protestant Church of Queen Elizabeth I. This is, of course — as far as Spenser is concerned — Good and True (in stark contrast with Elizabeth’s predecessor Queen Mary, and her Catholic Church, represented by the character of Duessa).
The Faerie Queene, even though it was never finished, was extremely influential, and bona fide examples of Una as a genuine given name in England date from the early 17th Century.
But this Latin Una is not the only Una of the British Isles. There is another, with an even older pedigree, over the Celtic Sea — Irish Úna.
This Una — pronounced ‘OO-nuh’, and sometimes Anglicized as Oona or Oonagh — is a name from Irish mythology. One Una was, ironically enough, a fairy queen — the wife of Finnbarr.
The best known, however, was a wife of Finn McCool. It was she who saved the day with her cunning when the Scottish giant Bennandonner crossed the Giant’s Causeway (which Finn had built) to fight Finn.
Una concocted a plan to trick Bennandonner into thinking Finn was far bigger, stronger and ‘more giant’ than Bennandonner. She dressed Finn up to look like a baby — and told Bennandonner that this enormous baby was Finn’s child.
This spooked Bennandonner enough, but while he waited for Finn to come home, Una gave him and the ‘baby’ an enormous steak to eat. The scary baby managed fine — but Bennandonner couldn’t eat a mouthful — the reason? The ‘baby’ had a real steak, but Una gave Bennandonner a rock painted to look like one.
This was all too much for Bennandonner, and he hot-footed it back to Scotland, tearing up the Causeway as he went.
In Modern Irish, úna actually means ‘famine’, but Úna is generally thought to have derived from the Old Irish uan ‘lamb’, and as well as appearing in myth, Úna was used as a genuine given name in medieval Ireland.
After the 17th Century, Irish names were usually ‘translated’ into English names — chosen sometimes by meaning, and sometimes by resemblance.
Thus Úna was turned into the English Agnes, due to the shared ‘lamb’ theme — for although Agnes does not derive from the Latin agnus ‘lamb’, its similarity meant that it was strongly associated with the fluffy creatures.
Others used were Winnie and Juno, because of their similarity in appearance and sound.
Although it is difficult to tell whether the Latin or Irish Una is being used, Una, Oona and Oonagh are all found in the 19th Century — and not just in Ireland.
None is seeing much use at the moment. In the UK, Una was nowhere near the top 1000 in 2010, while Oona and Oonagh languished below the 2000s.
Una is similarly scarce in the US, where in 2010, the Latin Una was found more frequently spelled phonetically as Yuna. There were also a few examples of Yoona.
Oona is extremely rare, and Oonagh doesn’t feature at all.
Una also has some interesting meanings in other languages. In Italian and Spanish, una is the feminine indefinite pronoun – i.e. ‘a’ – as well as ‘one’, just like in Latin.
In the South American language Tupi, una means ‘black’, and features in the name of the mythical South American snake the boyuna ‘black snake’, while in Old Norse, una means ‘to dwell contentedly’, ‘to enjoy’, ‘to rejoice’ and ‘to be content with (one’s lot)’.
There are various rivers and towns around the world called Una too, such as the Una River in Croatia, and Una in Gujurat, India. There’s even a genus of butterfly called Una.
So if you’re thinking Luna, but worried it’s too Harry Potter, why not consider the lovely, lonely Una instead?
Nook of Names 