Old Norse names

Old Norse was the North Germanic language of the Vikings and of medieval Scandinavia, spoken from roughly the 8th to the 14th centuries. It is the ancestor of the modern Scandinavian languages: Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, and Faroese. Icelandic has changed the least over the centuries and remains especially close to it, which is why modern Icelanders can still read the medieval sagas with relatively little difficulty.

Old Norse names often drew on gods, nature, and warrior words, and the elements were frequently combined. Freya comes from the goddess Freyja, whose name means "lady." Astrid is the modern form of the Old Norse Astrithr (Astridr), built from ass, "god," and fridr, "beautiful" or "beloved." Eric comes from Eirikr, usually read as ei, "ever, always," plus rikr, "ruler," giving the sense "ever ruler," though the first element is sometimes explained instead as einn, "one, alone."

Norse names reached English in two waves. The first came with Viking settlement of northern and eastern England in the 9th and 10th centuries, which left Norse personal names and place names across the region. The second is a modern revival driven by interest in Norse mythology and Scandinavian culture, which has returned names such as Freya and Astrid to English-speaking parents.

Not every name carrying an Old Norse tag actually belongs to it. Freya, Astrid, and Eric are securely Old Norse, and Colbie traces to a place name from the Old Norse byname Koli, "coal, dark," plus byr, "farm, settlement." Oscar is divided between an Irish reading, "deer friend," and an Old Norse or Old English one (Asgeirr or Osgar), so its Norse claim is only partial. Rowan is primarily a Gaelic name, an Anglicized form of Ruadhan from ruad, "red," and also an English tree name, so the Old Norse label on it is shaky at best. Tate goes back to the Old English name Tata rather than to Old Norse.