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Cordelia is a name of myth, mystery and complicated etymology. Like Arthur, Cordelia has long been the source of conjecture with connections with both Celtic and Latin. And, like Arthur, I feel that Cordelia's etymology is also a mixture of common elements and influences.
You can find numerous meanings attributed to Cordelia, including "little heart," "daughter of the sea," "jewel of the sea," "lion heart" and "pure maiden" — most are based on very tentative assumptions.
Famously, Cordelia is the name of the faithful daughter in Shakespeare's King Lear, first performed in 1606. The story was not one of Shakespeare's own invention but his own retelling of a much older tale. Holinshed's Chronicles (a source which Shakespeare frequently based his plays on) recounted the story in 1577, using the spelling Cordeilla* and an anonymous Elizabethan play, staged in 1594 named The True Chronicle History of King Leir, and his three daughters, Gonorill, Ragan, and Cordella.
Shakespeare was also thought to have been influenced by John Higgin's The Mirror for Migistrates: The Tragoedye of Cordila (1574) in which the name is spelt Cordila, Cordilla, Cordile and Cordell* and possibly Spenser's The Faerie Queene (Book 2, Canto 10) in 1590 which also mentions the story of King Lear (Leyr). Spenser's spellings vary within the verse: he lists both Cordelia and Cordeill, and Regan and Rigan*.
The first account of King Lear and his daughters dates back to 1135 in Geoffrey of Monmouth's History of the Kings of Britain (Historia Regum Britanniae). In this account King Leir attempted to find husbands for his daughters Gonerilla, Regan and Cordeilla so that he could divide his kingdom among them. To see who deserved the best part, Leir wanted to find which daughter loved him best. Gonerilla and Regan flattered their father; Cordeilla did not and was given no dowry. Aganippus, the King of the Franks, loved her and married her in spite of that and Cordeilla went with him to Gaul. Years later, Gonerilla and Regan usurped their father's throne. Leir fled to Gaul to see Cordeilla and she amassed an army to help restore him to his kingdom. They succeeded and Leir lived for three more year before Cordeilla, then widowed, succeeded him as Queen of Britain. She was eventually deposed by Regan's sons Cunedda and Morgan.
So, where did Geoffrey of Monmouth get the name Cordeilla from? There are two prevalent theories:
St Cordula was a companion of the legendary (and most likely not historical) St Ursula, the daughter King Dionotus of Cornwall who set out on pilgramage with a retinue of one hundred virgins. They were all captured and beheaded by a Hun army.
According to the Roman Martyrology:
"At Cologne, St. Cordula, who was one of the companions of St. Ursula. Being terrified by the punishments and slaughter of the others, she hid herself, but repenting her deed, on the next day she declared herself to the Huns of her own accord, and thus was the last of them all to receive the crown of martyrdom."
The name Cordula likely derives from the Latin cordis meaning "heart" and the suffix -ul , therefore meaning "little heart."
This would be a fitting meaning for Cordeilla/Cordelia who is often regarded as having a faithful heart. Experts have also noted that Shakespeare uses the word "heart" and "love" frequently in King Lear.
St Ursula was a popular medieval saint, so it is possible Geoffrey was aware of the legend, though the earliest known mention of St Cordula dates from 1278 when St Albertus Magnus spoke of her as a saint.
If, like many of the other names in Geoffrey's account (Leir/Llyr, Cunedagius/Cuneda, Marganus/Morgan), Cordeilla is actually Celtic, then the most likely source is Creiddylad. She appears in Welsh legend in the tale of Culhwch and Olwen as the daughter of Lludd of the Silver Hand and was known as a the most beautiful maiden in the British isles. She was fought over by two of Arthur's warriors: Gwythyr and Gwyn ap Nudd until it was decreed that she live with her father until a final battle on Judgement Day which would determine who would be her husband.
Some early commentators have speculated that Creiddylad means "daughter of the sea." I can find no linguistic connection for this, however. It seems these early commentators were connecting Creiddylad as the daughter of Llyr (Leir), not Llud, and, as Llyr was the god of the sea (Llyr even means "sea") it is more a case that Cordelia is "the daughter of Llyr/the sea."
Around the same time, other scholars (such as C. M. Yonge, 1863) proposed that the name derived from the Celtic crair "a token, jewel, sacred object" . This basis, however, supposed that the full name was the lengthy Creirdyddlydd (note the extra 'r') — though we know the oldest spelling, recorded in the 14th century was Creidylat. It also erroneously assumed Creirdyddlydd was a form of Creirwy (which does derived from crair), who was a completely seperate figure in Welsh mythology. She, too, regarded as the most beautiful woman in the world.
A more likely theory, supported by K.M. Sheard, is that Creiddylad derives from the proto-Celtic kred "heart" (craidd in Welsh) and dligiton "duty, debt, law, right, priviledge" (dyled in Welsh). And so we come right back around to "heart" again.
Scholars are divided over the connection between Cordelia and Creiddylad. Some are sceptical of a connection between the two, partly because the stories of Creiddylad differs to Cordeilla's (though there is a strong father/daughter connection), and because, when Geoffrey's Historia Regum Britanniae was translated into Welsh, it did not turn back into Creiddylad.
Geoffrey, however, was writing in Latin but dealing with several elements of Welsh mythology. It seems likely to me that he would have come across Creiddylad. We know he was aware of Lludd of the Silver Hand and that Ludd and Llyr were confused by early Welsh chroniclers and copyists (even in Culhwch and Olwen where Creiddylad is first mentioned). Perhaps the Welsh translators were simply unaware that Geoffrey had used Creiddylad for Cordeilla so failed to translate it accordingly.
Perhaps also, given that Geoffrey of Monmouth (a native Welshman) was translating ancient British texts into Latin, he had some knowledge of Creidylat's connection with craidd "heart" and Latinised Creidylat as Cordeilla by using the Latin equivalent cordis.
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