Spacing considerations between extant fragments of the original manuscript suggest some crossout (or text now lost) here in Alma 31:7. In the transcript of 𝓞 for this passage, I suggested in a note the possibility that the word called might have been written in 𝓞 (as “and his name was called Helaman”). The verb call is sometimes used when someone’s personal name is referred to the first time in the text, as in the following examples:
The last example parallels the proposed emendation here of “and his name was called Helaman”.
Another possible explanation for the length of the lacuna in 𝓞 is that Oliver Cowdery misspelled the name Helaman on his first try and crossed out his error. One possibility could have been the name Helem, which could have been crossed out and followed inline by Helaman. (It is doubtful Oliver would have initially written Helam in 𝓞 since in that case he would probably have simply added inline the word-final an.) We have evidence that Oliver sometimes misspelled Helam as Helem and Helaman as Heleman (see the discussion under Mosiah 27:16).
Of course, we cannot be sure of the original reading for the text in this lacuna of 𝓞. Once more, we must resort to the reading of the printer’s manuscript, the earliest extant reading and, in this case, one that makes perfectly good sense. Elsewhere in the text there are 46 examples of “name (of Y) was X” (that is, without called ), including 11 with precisely the same syntax as in 𝓟 for Alma 31:7 (“and his name was X”):
Thus the critical text will accept the reading in 𝓟.
Summary: Accept in Alma 31:7 the earliest extant reading, “and his name was Helaman” (the reading in 𝓟), even though there is room in the lacuna of 𝓞 for about one more word (which was probably crossed out).