Onomastics (Onomatology) is the study of proper names of all kinds and the origins of names. The word is derived from the Greek wordounouma, (name). Toponymy, the study of place names, is one of the principal branches of onomastics.
At the intersection of various disciplines (historical, linguistic, literary), onomastics, whose autonomous scientific character is increasingly acknowledged by the international scientific community at large, is undergoing a period of new activity.
The contribution of studies in medieval onomastics, indispensable to the proliferation of detailed studies, is currently witnessing two ambitious research exercises on a vast scale.
The now established use of onomastics made by language historians, who are well aware of the value of the phono-morphological and lexical data provided by proper names and anthroponyms in Middle Age Latin documents for periods so bereft of written vernacular evidence, is likewise available.
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