A female name. this name, like Annabel (q.v.), was originally Scottish and is apparently unknown on the Continent. The earliest example noted is one Orabilis, d. of Ness, Lord of Leuchars, and sometimes said to be a g.d. of William the Lion, who married Robert de Quincy about the middle of the 12th C and became mother of Saer de Quincy, 1st Earl of Winchester. In 1255 Magdalen Laver was held by Arabella wife of John de Montpynçon. The name occurs in the 13th C in the forms Arable, Orable, Orabell. The Lady Arabella Stuart (1575—1615) was commonly called Arbell by her contemporaries, and Lyford 1655 gives both Arbella and Orabilis (which he derives from the Latin ‘easy to be intreated’). The probabilities seem to point to the derivation of this name from Annabel by a process of dissimilation (cf. the development of Durham from Dunholm). But there can be no certainty, and there is another factor to be considered. In the chansons de geste, Orable, Oriabel, Oriabiaus occur as a m. name; Orable is also given as the name of a queen of Arabia; and the name of Arabia is variously rendered Arabe, Arrabe, Arable, Arrable, Errabe, Esrabe, Erable, Araboi, Arabloi. It is doubtful whether there can be any connexion between these and the 12th-C Scottish name, but the possibility cannot be altogether ruled out. Arabel and especially its latinized form Arabella came into fashion again in the late 18th and early 19th C, but it is not now much used.

Now more frequent in Scotland than in England, it is in the latter considered somewhat Victorian. In its Teutonic origin, it means either ‘eagle (ari)-heroine’ or ‘hearth (arin)-heroine’. Charlotte Yonge may well be right when she says: ‘I am much tempted to believe that both Arabella and that other perplexing name, Annabella, may once have been Arnhilda, cut down into Arbell, or Anable, and then amplified.’

Corrupted from the old name Orabel, Orabele, q. v.

Latin (feminine) - Fair altar.

A Teutonic name, meaning: Eagle heroine. (Latin) Arabian belle.