The Name, Ilona

Names tell stories.Often they are the oldest words we use and inside them sound the faint echoes of a long and distant past. The names of places sometimes remember who we were and how we used to see the world. ~ Alistair Moffat, 'Before Scotland: The Story of Scotland Before History '

Perhaps it was the name, or perhaps it was just my nature, but curiosity and machinations of the mind led me along an investigative trail. Not merely into the definition of the name which began the whole venture, but into cultures, history, and the subjects of etymology and linguistics. And here, is the story of it all. My name is an unusual one in American culture; and as such, it is often positively remarked upon, misspelled, mispronounced, and requiring attention from those addressing me. So, it is not surprising that I have had a fascination with its meaning. It has become a bar by which I judge the quality of baby-name books and name lists. If the author does not include the name, Ilona, then I can only conclude a lack of scholarship on their part.

There was the tantalizing knowledge that this was not only a "name", it was a family name, and one which was popular in the Hungarian heritage. It meant something, stood for something, greater than my own unique self. What could that be? And what import could that hold for my destiny, if any?

In other cultures, a name often holds much for an individual. In fact, in the study of the Bible many insights may be gained by name meanings. The Hebrews always had a meaning for their names, and their language is very picturesque. When naming an animal,for example, they used descriptions of qualities, which in turn helps to identify the animal in question. Sometimes the people of cultures were expressing qualities they valued when naming their children, and sometimes names of individuals changed as they exhibited certain qualities. A name is a most personal identifier.

Almost all name books identify the name "Ilona" with the name of "Helen". The further I look into things, the less I might question that. And yet, there are some things to look at in this. The name Helen is a "Hellenization", a Greek version of the name. In other words, it was the Greek interpretation of a name which perhaps originated within a different sort of language. The name 'Helen' seems identified with the Greek god "Helios" representing the sun, and usually interpreted as "Bright and shining". One of the main reasons I questioned the identification of "Ilona" with "Helen" is the fact that it turns up in both the cultures of Finland and Hungary. To me, that suggested that perhaps it was derived from within the language group of the Ugric/Finno forms rather than the Indo/European one of Greece. Although the Greeks named people after their gods and goddesses regardless of the sexual identification, the ancients didn't usually correlate the sun with femininity. To further complicate the quest for the name meaning is the story of Helen which is entwined with the city of Troy, found in the land which is now Turkey, a country whose language is in the Ugric/Finno group. So upon a circuitous quest I went.

Not being a scholar, but a curious sort of person, I started looking around at the word groups common between the languages in the Hungarian and Finn category. I started by looking at sites that were about the Ugaric/Finno language group. Then after finding some leads on word roots and (pre/suf)fixes for words, I went to language dictionaries in the related languages and put in queries on words that might produce another lead. Unscientific, but producing a couple interesting possibilities. This is the type of thing curious people do, and I suppose it seems a monumental waste of time for the more practical minded! Among the things I came up with are these:

• The 'na' ending in these languages had the connotation of" having the qualities of " or back in the Sumeranian " to be with". I saw a possibility that it might be the usage of the end portion of the name Ilona, particularly in the way a Hungarian pronounces the name: E'-LOH-nah ... the nah being a short end sound, not drawn out as other similar names in more western Euro countries.
• The "Ilo" part had several possibilities, but since the idea usually associated with the name was of beauty, I found the ideas of the Hungarian "illat" meaning fragrance as close, and they also have an "ill�" meaning fitting or decorus. Within the Finn definitions for the word "ilo" are ideas of bliss,delight ,satisfaction, rejoicing, all of which could be reactions to a fragrant smell or perfume.
• The Estonian word for perfume also has a form very similar and could be pronounced like "Ilona".

All this led my own conclusions to identify the feminine name "Ilona" with a meaning more identified with the delight of a fragrant perfume rather than dazzling the eye, as the name of Helen would indicate. So now to end with a sound byte useful for a name definition book, how about "Ilona- one who has a delightful perfume of joy"? I'll go for that, since I think fragrance is one of the enjoyments of life.

Sometimes I can't believe all the eye-straining lists of words I pored over, but it does take one into the history of origins of language and nations. The migrations and settlements of those that became the Hungarian people ranged across the Asian steppes to possibly be a part of the Scythians, and traces of these peoples seem to be within the Carpathian mountains retaining an unusual language formation to this day. The confederations of early times, and even some of the values of cultures are traced within names and languages. My dad grew up around the lakes, where a a number of Finns immigrated, and states " They are the hardest working, toughest people I know"; and the history of their land and that of Hungarians are of people who survive in spite of the toughest of circumstances. Not always the wisest, but very brave people. People who have stood against the armies of empires, at great cost to themselves, people as unique, complex, and eccentric as their languages.

Below are found some of the bits of information I kept in my notes:
petes/linguistics/Morphology-define
word=ilo -finn
word=perfume&language=English -estonian
cases -votiv
-Hungarian illo
Hungarian -dictionary
-Hungarian illat


l�nyeg- essence,MAG
illat- fragrance,MAG
ill�- fitting,decorus,MAG
na =mother /Scyth
n� =to be with /Sumerian
� difficult sound for Russians and Finns; like the first part of the diphtong in 'most' or 'road'. Do not confuse this with Portuguese - the only other European language using o with tilde.-Estonian dialectical mark
�l, �la, �li = to carry; deliver; carrier; etc. -Sum.
iha = desire; ihalda- = desire, long (Es)
/ iha = allurements, charms; grace; merry; ihaile- = admire; ihalta- = admire, gape at; long, yearn for; ihaile- = admire; ihana = delicious, lovely; ihastu- = be captivated, be charmed, become delighted; fall in love (Fi)
Now to end on a note of further speculation, years ago within a fairly extensive book of names ( which I now forget the name of) the name Ilona was interpreted as meaning "Beautiful Spinner". None of my sources turned up anything similar,so it remains a mystery whether that could have highlighted any other shades of meaning. Perhaps the fact that the Magyars were a herding nomadic people,along with the long association of the name with "beautiful" may have inspired the author of that definition? In further reading on Hungarian and other fairy tales, especially in Eastern Europe, the fairy folk were often identified as those who interfered or helped with household duties such as spinning or milking. I could guess that the spinner and the fairy were the same person, and that the definition chosen for the name derived from one of the old fairy tales.
And how might I have been different, as a person, if my parents had named me "Jane"? ...would the rose, by any other name, have been the rose that we now know?....and could this lead to an essay on the Latin nomenclature of plants? ...Let's all hope not.

I have found more on the beginnings of the name, 'Ilona'. One of the early pagan beginnings had a myth of someone called "T�nd�r-Ilona". I believe it is from this that the long association of the name with 'beautiful' derives.The word, T�N-D�R, is sort of a fairy person. The word relates to the Altaic languages TEN-GRI and Sumerian DIN-GIR, who are the the lesser gods of the Sumerians of Mesopotamia. The stories most related to Ilona:
The queen of the "nymphs", who were often associated with heaven and wet places, mountains etc., was the beautiful "T�nd�r-Ilona", who often was represented by the swan in Hungarian fairy tales. perhaps a variation of the Parthian and Mesopotamian NANA or Sumerian goddess Dingir-INANA, the daughter of the Moon, who was the young goddess of the heavens and also at times was warlike, and a seductress. Sometimes she is called sz�p-aszony meaning beautiful queen, in Hungarian. (sz�p means beautiful, asszony is a title for wife now, but was also for "queen").
It was sort of a weird coincidence that I had chosen "Reflecting Pool" and the motif of a swan for my website. Although the swan was used earlier in my designs.