Guilhem, William of Orange, Guillaume Fierabrace, or William Short-Nose (755–812). The first well-known carrier of the name was Charlemagne's cousin William of Gellone, a.k.a. the Norman surnames Villon and Villamaux "little William"), unlike the Central French and Southern Norman that turned the Germanic Wi- into Gui- >. The spelling and phonetics Wi- is a characteristic trait of the Northern French dialects, but the pronunciation changed in Norman from to in the 12th century (cf. or in the Cauchois variant forms of common words such as osias (plural of osè "bird", older oisel) / Regular Norman oisiaus "birds" (French sing.
For instance, this development can be followed in the different versions of the name in the Wace's Roman de Rou.
Then, the triphthong -iau was submitted to a monophthongation localized on the second part of the triphthong áu > āò > ā. Historically, there was first a triphthongation of -elm (early Gallo-Romance form WILLELMU) into + in Old Norman-French, quite similar in Old Central French +. In fact, the form William is clearly identified as typical of the Old Norman form Williame, Willame, because first, the English language should have retained (h)elm (see common words helm, helmet, in French heaume), second, -iaume (typical of Popular French, see Guillaume) turned to -iame (typical of some Norman and Picard dialects) > English -iam. That is a compound of two distinct elements: wil = "will or desire" helm Old English helm "helmet, protection" English helm "knight's large helmet". By regular sound changes, the native, inherited English form of the name should be *Wilhelm as well (although the name is not actually attested in the history of English, and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle refers to William the Conqueror as Willelm). William is related to the given name Wilhelm (cf.
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