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Blech. No, I don't like it at all, for a boy or a girl, but especially not for a girl. I do know a little girl with this name, however. She's about 7 years old, but I'm not positive of the spelling. To me, it's a university in CA, and also just too surname-y for a fn, and too masculine for a girl.

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~Heather~

I actually know a little boy named Berkeley, so I have a hard time seeing it on a girl. I like the name, but I'd never use it, I don't think.

I don't care for the name at all to be honest. It doesn't seem feminine to me. I prefer Blair, Brynn, and Blythe.

A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square

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Is what I think of, and I also think of a university.

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I don't consider Brooklyn and Berkeley the same at all. Both Brooke and Lynn are female names, so Brooklyn can be seen as a compound of these names. It sounds feminine. Berkeley does not sound like a fn at all, and especially not a female one imo.

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Vera Lynn (UK) sang this famous song around WWII:

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That certain night,
The night we met,
There was magic abroad in the air.
There were angels dining at the Ritz
And a nightingale sang in Berk'ley Square

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I may be right, I may be wrong,
But I'm perfectly willing to swear
That when you turn'd and smiled at me,
A nightingale sang in Berk'ley Square

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"It does not become me to make myself smaller than I am." (Edith Södergran 1891-1923)

This message was edited 1/1/2006, 4:45 PM

This is going to sound mean, but it is ugly to me. It is not feminine sounding at all, and it seems pretentious. I don't like place names anyway, but this isn't a good one at all.

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Also, I'm probably the only one, but when I hear it and its probable nn Berk, it sounds like Burke to me. I associate that with William Burke and William Hare, who murdered people in 1800s England when grave robbing proved lucrative. This was during a time when laws allowed scientific study on bodies to be done on only cadavers from recently executed criminals. They wanted to supply more bodies than they could dig, so they started making them. These two would sit on the victims chest and hold the mouth and nose closed. That way, there wouldn't be visible marks on the body to show murder (unless you know what to look for), so they weren't suspected at first. Eventually they were caught, and now, "to burke" is an actual verb meaning to kill someone by smothering, or to stifle.
More info: http://www.crimelibrary.com/serial_killers/weird/burke/index_1.html

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So even though that was long and somewhat unnecessary :) I just wanted to demonstrate one of the reasons I dislike the name. But anyway...

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No as the obvious nickname Berk doesnt have a particularly nice meaning though to most people a berk means an idiot it also has a meaning in cockney rhyming slang that is a lot worse

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http://www.londonslang.com/db/b/

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As a middle name if it were a family name maybe

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Paula

I don't really like it when used for a girl but as a middle name I guess it wouldn't be too bad. It might become popular like Brooklyn one day but not immediately. I dislike Brooklyn too.

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As a MN I guess it is ok. I'm not a great fan of place names, and no, not as FN. I like it MUCH more than Brooklyn though.