Thanks, Keith. I think my Mahala could easily have been of Hebrew origin and may be that rather than Arabic. Maybe from the Bible, but perhaps from a more direct route, through settlers of Jewish origin. Appalachia has a lot of Mahalas or Mahalahs in its past, Elkanahs too, for that matter. I believe Castlio or Castillo was sometimes Anglicized to Castile. I see a typo in my post: I meant my other correspondent believes her Mahalah was full-blooded Cherokee. Yes, the N/A groups obviously adopted names of other groups. I know this is off the HOWELL subject, but I came by an interesting piece of information the other day. My late husband's nephew has found that one of his lines from England was full-blooded Jewish. The Jewish couple came to America and their son, born in Virginia in 1775, converted to Christianity and became a minister. So one of my husband's gr-gr-grandfather's was Jewish. I find it interesting that we are all such mixtures. Anne ----- Original Message ----- From: "keith d bailey" <kbailey@frontiernet.net> To: "Anne" <annerhai@ttmol.com> Sent: Monday, December 22, 2003 10:45 AM Subject: Re: [HOWELL] Re:Mahala > Hi, I hope this is helpful for you. > The surname, Lowe, that you mentioned is probably Germanic. Castlio > sounds Latin (Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian, excetra) for Castle. The > name Mahalah is of Hebrew origins. The meanings of its root deals with > lying down; either in sickness or prayer. The name is found in the Bible in > 1st Chronicles. I don't know about its use as a surname by Arabs, but that > would be possible since Arabic and Hebrew are both Semitic languages. The > other name you mentioned, Elkanah, is also from the Bible. Many Native > American's took-on Christian names to more easily be excepted by white folk, > especially the Cherokee. In the late 1700's and early 1800's Old Testament > names were more common.