" JEZABEL " AND " ISABEL."
TO THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."]
am surprised to find from your own remark, assuming the identity of these names, and from the confession of a correspondent in the Spectator of October 29th, that the history of the latter name seems not to be generally under- stood. I venture, therefore, with your permission, to add yet one more note on the subject.
The truth might have been found from so accessible a book as Prescott's "History of Ferdinand and Isabella." Speaking (Vol. III., p. 199) of Queen Isabella, he alludes to " her illus- trious namesake, Elizabeth of England," and appends the note, "Isabel, the name of the Catholic Queen, is correctly rendered into English by that of Elizabeth." If we look to documents of the age of Isabel of Spain, we find that in Latin she is Elizabeth. A book of Latin verses in her praise was published in the Netherlands in 1497, "Ad divam Helisabet
reginam Epodon. lib. 1; " and Isabella (or Eliza- beth), wife of Philip IV. of Spain, is described in Italian in an account of her funeral in 1645, as D. Elisabetta Borbone. There is a book, published at Brussels in 1622, written by Le Mire, entitled " Isabellae Sanctae : Elisabetta Joannis Bapt. mater, Elisabetha Andr. Regis Hung. filia, Isabella regina Portugalliae, Isabella S. Lud. Galliae regis soror."
That Jezabel and Elizabeth (Isabel) are distinct names, is shown by the Greek, which writes the first (in the Septuagint) 14iiI3eX or -Pot, and the other. 'Eniar'cl3er.
How the Elizabeth of the New Testament came to be changed in Spanish into Isabel is a distinct question, on which I will only venture to suggest that the Spaniards at an early age (Ysabel is found in print as early as 1488) must have sup- posed the El to be their article, and therefore discarded it, leaving Isabet, and then, by a curious law of pronunciation, of which many examples might be found, put 1 in the place of t. Thus "Madrid" is sometimes written" Madril."—I am, Sir, &e., [May we suggest a totally different origin for the name? Is not " Isabella " simply a bad spelling for " Aissa bella," " pretty Ayesha "? " Ayesha," properly " Aissa," must have been the name of thousands of Moorish women in Spain.— En. Spectator.]
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