The Origin of "Callum"

This blog is dedicated to chronicling the life and times of the Morris family: Bryant, Elise and Henry.

For our inaugural post, we thought we would explain the origin of Henry's middle name. We are often asked if Callum is a family name. It is not. We discovered the name while watching one of our favorite TV shows, the Showtime series "The Tudors." (If you haven't seen it, "The Tudors" tells the story of the young King Henry VIII and his love affair with, and eventual marriage to, Anne Boleyn. It's something of a cross between daytime soap opera and Masterpiece theater.) The English actor Callum Blue plays one of Henry's courtiers. We saw the name in the credits and liked the sound of it.

In case you're wondering, Henry is not named for King Henry VIII or any other King Henry for that matter. He is named for Elise's grandfather, Heinrich Georgi, who was a Transylvanian Saxon.

Callum (or Colm, Colum, etc.) is the Scottish/Gaelic version of the Latin "Columba", meaning "dove". The name's origin is often traced to St. Columba of Iona, an Irish missionary who converted the Kingdom of the Picts to Christianity. The life of St. Columba contains one of the first known copyright disputes as well as the first recorded siting of the Loch Ness monster. Although not common in the States, the name Callum is popular in Britain, especially Scotland.

But enough history, here's a picture of young Henry Callum eating lunch on Saturday: