Marty meets up with a young slave woman. As a child, she was the slave to a young white girl. The two played together and loved each other like sisters.
I had to come up with mid-19th century names for these girls, so I drew from some of the less common family names from my husband's family tree. One was Jemima, or "Mima", which was found several times on the Echols family tree. The other was Keziah. Actually, none of the women in his line had the first name Keziah or Kesiah, but his paternal great-grandmother's surname was Kizziar.
When I went back in the historical records for Kizziar, I found that name had a variety of spellings, including Cizia in 1799:
Cuzziah in 1800:
Kisiah in 1802:
and Kizziah in 1813:
What was consistent was that when I did a name search for Kissiah or Kezziah or any of the many spelling variations, what I almost always came up with was Kesiah or Keziah or another spelling variation as as woman's GIVEN name.
Because of the "Aunt Jemima" stereotype, I decided to give the Jemima name to my white character. I named my slave character Keziah.
Then I got to wondering. Where did the name Keziah as a given name for women come from? I knew it was common in the 19th century to use (a) family names, (b) names of famous people, or (3) Biblical names.
So, I looked it up.
Keziah, or Kezia, was one of the daughters of Job in the Old Testament.
So, when I got to the part of my story when Marty asks the young slave woman how she spells her name, the woman responds that she does not know. Slaves are not allowed to learn how to read or write, she only knows that she was named after one of the daughters of Job in the Bible.
Marty reads the part in the Bible about Job having three daughters. The second daughter was named Kezia. None of the sons were named, but the book states that the three daughters were given an inheritance like their brothers.
Guess what the name is of the oldest daughter of Job?
Jemima.
Yes, I love it when things come together.
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