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Generally speaking, the names of Hardy's female characters just don't convince me. Bathsheba makes me think of that custom (Puritan, I think) of opening the Bible to a random page and using the first name that appeared. That's the only way I could imagine anyone actually selecting Bathsheba in real life, and even then, if it was me, I'd "accidentally" drop it and "have to" start again until I hit on something more polite like Ruth.