Took out the official and legal title stuff, because that concept just didn't exist in the 10th century, to the best of my knowledge. There was no administrative mechanism for "official and legal" titles -- births were not regularly registered, names changed as family possessions changed, etc. For most leading families in what had been Francia (and remember, Louis the Child died in 911, and there were still Carolingian family members around after his death), there were very few regularized titles -- especially titles bound to specific chunks of land! If somebody can show me real documentation (from the time, and not some later document based on an assumption) for this, I'll put this back.
J Hofmann Kemp
Sorry -- the comments don't go in the article -- here they are:
From HJ -- A note on nobility : names entered in Royal and Noble registries such as "Stammtafeln" remain unchanged including the "von" or "von und zu". That is part of the title ,earned , by rendering service to the empire.
H. Stoyan at the University of Erlangen lists Dubrawka as follows: "Dubrawka von Boehmen".
- I think most of us have a good idea of how titles work -- you might want to consider that basing everything on what was true for the HRE in the early modern period may not always have been the case. The Stammtafeln didn't actually exist when Dubrawka was alive, so they aren't a good source. Also, your explanation is somewhat simplistic -- titles were often appropriated by their holders, and after a generation or two, were considered fact. For the period we're talking about, your identification of "von" and "zu" as part of a formal title is just flat out wrong.
As far as Stoyan using "dubrawka von Boehmen," I'm sorry, but unless there's a sentence that says "Upon event X, Dubrawka was granted the title D. of Bohemia," it isn't proof. WE MODERN PEOPLE often agree on nomenclature for certain historical characters as a convenience. It is much more likely the case that Dubrawka is referred to as 'of Bohemia' because someone a hundred or so years ago started calling her that, and it was useful enough that others followed. It is Extremely Unlikely that it had anything to do with an official title -- which as a woman would have been a very rare occurrance anyway. Relying on genealogical sources is bound to lead you into these kind of discussions, by the way -- they are notorious for including a lot of wishful thinking rather than hard scholarship. J Hofmann Kemp
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