William is a male given name of Germanic origin. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of England in 1066, and remained so throughout the Middle Ages and into the modern era. It is sometimes abbreviated "Wm." Shortened familiar versions in English include Will, Wills, Willy, Willie, Bill, and Billy. A common Irish form is Liam. Scottish diminutives include Wull, Willie or Wullie (as in Oor Wullie or the play Douglas). Female forms are Willa, Willemina, Wilma and Wilhelmina. Etymology William is related to the given name Wilhelm (cf. Proto-Germanic ᚹᛁᛚᛃᚨᚺᛖᛚᛗᚨᛉ, *Wiljahelmaz > German Wilhelm and Old Norse Vilhjalmr). 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). That is a compound of two distinct elements: wil = "will or desire"; helm; Old English helm "helmet, protection"; English helm "knight's large helmet". The form William is 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 [iaʷm] (typical of Popular French, see Guillaume) turned to -iame [iam] (typical of some Norman and Picard dialects) > English -iam. Historically, there was first a triphthongation of -elm (early Gallo-Romance form WILLELMU) into [iaʷ] + [m] in Old Norman-French, quite similar in Old Central French [eaʷ] + [m]. Then, the triphthong -iau was submitted to a monophthongation localized on the second part of the triphthong áu > āò > ā. For instance, this development can be followed in the different versions of the name in the Wace's Roman de Rou. or in the Cauchois variant forms of common words such as osias (plural of osè "bird", older oisel) / Regular Norman oisiaus "birds" (French sing. oiseau, pl. oiseaux). The spelling and phonetics Wi- [wi] is a characteristic trait of the Northern French dialects, but the pronunciation changed in Norman from [wi] to [vi] in the 12th century (cf. the Norman surnames Villon and Villamaux "little William"), unlike the Central French and Southern Norman that turned the Germanic Wi- into Gui- [gwi] > [gi]. The Modern French spelling is . The first well-known carrier of the name was Charlemagne's cousin William of Gellone, a.k.a. Guilhem, William of Orange, Guillaume