Bodo (given name)

Bodo (variants Botho, Boto, Boddo, Potho, Boda, Puoto, etc.) is an Old High German name, also adopted in Modern German. It is in origin a short name or hypocorism for Germanic names with a first element Bod-, Puot-, reflecting the verbal root beud- "to bid, command".[1] As a monothematic name, Old High German Boto, Old Saxon Bodo, could mean "lord, commander" or alternatively "messenger" (c.f. Old English bod "command; message", boda "messenger, angel").[2] Full dithematic names with this first element (attested for the medieval period but not surviving into modern use) included Bodegisil, Bothad, Bodomar, Boderad, Poterich, Bodirid, Butwin, Potelfrid, Botolf, Podalolf, Bodenolf.[1]

The Anglo-Saxon cognate was Beda (West Saxon Bīeda, Northumbrian Bǣda, Anglian Bēda).[3]

Middle Ages
Early Modern
  • Bodo Otto (1711–1787), a Senior Surgeon of the Continental Army during the American Revolution
Modern

References
  1. Förstemann, Altdeutsches Namenbuch s.v. BUD
  2. BOD (nordicnames.de), citing Wilfried Seibicke, Historisches Deutsches Vornamenbuch.
  3. J. Insley, "Portesmutha" in: Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde vol. 23, Walter de Gruyter (2003), 291.
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