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ArchivesRe: Whither middle names?
in reply to a message by Anneza
Thanks for your great comments!
"she used to find eleven pages of John Smith, from which she had to identify the right one, seven pages of John William Smith, and one single entry for John William George Smith."
Yes, but this is really only a problem because most people name their children John and William, etc. If they could learn to dish out some more varied names - and it's not as if there aren't enough to choose from! -, that would be a huge improvement, IMO.
"This made sense to me, and Peter David Alastair, Caroline Beatrice Mary and Beatrice Elizabeth Anne are the proof!"
BTW, do you know there is a U.S. comic book writer (he currently writes Supergirl and Captain Marvel) and Star Trek novelist called Peter David? David is his surname (he is Jewish), and he's got a middle name beginning with A (I don't know what it is, though). On message boards and the like he always signs his comments with "PAD".
The Roman Catholic habit you speak of makes sense, and I also seem to recall that pre-Christian Romans had lots of middle names, at least the aristocrats did. Didn't the emperors take on additional names according to the regions they conquered...?
"The British royals have three or four given names each, but I suppose they don't really have surnames!"
Same thing with the Danish royals. The surnames of the kings and queens are just Rex and Regina. Danish kings, in recent centuries, have always been called either Frederik or Christian, and the current crown prince - soon to take over from our aging queen, not unlike in the UK - is a Frederik. His younger brother is called Joachim, but I'm pretty sure he's got both Christian and several other names for middle names. Joachim is married to Princess Alexandra, who's from Hong Kong and half-Chinese (the other half is possibly British), and they have a son called Nikolaj and another on the way (not to my knowledge named yet).
Yes, double names are about as prevalent here as elsewhere. Very typical Danish double names (male) is Svend-Aage and (female) Anne-Mette ("Mette" being a pet form of Margaret, or, as the name typically looks in Danish, Margrethe, which is of course also the name of our current queen, who's the second queen to bear that name. Queen Margrethe the First united both Norway and Sweden under Danish rule - too bad it didn't last! j/k), and indeed Anne-Marie. There are no Dietrichs in Denmark, though; that's German. Hans is common (as in Hans Christian Andersen; until not so long ago, Hans-Christian was a quite common Danish double name), but not quite as common as in Germany and Switzerland. As a surname, though, Hansen is one of the absolutely most common ones, together with Nielsen, Jensen, Christensen and indeed my own Sørensen. The Danish equivalent of John Smith is Jens Hansen.
It seems to me, however, that (esp. male) double names are increasingly going out of fashion here.
In Slavic and English-speaking cultures nicknames are very common, but in Denmark they really aren't. Of course parents will affectionately call their kids "honey" and such, but nicknames based on the given name, and used into adulthood, are extremely rare (it wasn't always like that, since many of our names - like Mette/Margrethe - in fact *are* nickname forms, but that way of using names has disappeared). What we sometimes do is to use initials, though. A Hans-Peter is typically called "HP" - at least both of the Hans-Peters I know are. Many names do have nicknames, but they tend to be offensive rather than affectionate, and used for taunting, which of course means that they don't evolve into new forms of proper names.
Well, look at me talking! I'll stop now. :-)
- Tue
"she used to find eleven pages of John Smith, from which she had to identify the right one, seven pages of John William Smith, and one single entry for John William George Smith."
Yes, but this is really only a problem because most people name their children John and William, etc. If they could learn to dish out some more varied names - and it's not as if there aren't enough to choose from! -, that would be a huge improvement, IMO.
"This made sense to me, and Peter David Alastair, Caroline Beatrice Mary and Beatrice Elizabeth Anne are the proof!"
BTW, do you know there is a U.S. comic book writer (he currently writes Supergirl and Captain Marvel) and Star Trek novelist called Peter David? David is his surname (he is Jewish), and he's got a middle name beginning with A (I don't know what it is, though). On message boards and the like he always signs his comments with "PAD".
The Roman Catholic habit you speak of makes sense, and I also seem to recall that pre-Christian Romans had lots of middle names, at least the aristocrats did. Didn't the emperors take on additional names according to the regions they conquered...?
"The British royals have three or four given names each, but I suppose they don't really have surnames!"
Same thing with the Danish royals. The surnames of the kings and queens are just Rex and Regina. Danish kings, in recent centuries, have always been called either Frederik or Christian, and the current crown prince - soon to take over from our aging queen, not unlike in the UK - is a Frederik. His younger brother is called Joachim, but I'm pretty sure he's got both Christian and several other names for middle names. Joachim is married to Princess Alexandra, who's from Hong Kong and half-Chinese (the other half is possibly British), and they have a son called Nikolaj and another on the way (not to my knowledge named yet).
Yes, double names are about as prevalent here as elsewhere. Very typical Danish double names (male) is Svend-Aage and (female) Anne-Mette ("Mette" being a pet form of Margaret, or, as the name typically looks in Danish, Margrethe, which is of course also the name of our current queen, who's the second queen to bear that name. Queen Margrethe the First united both Norway and Sweden under Danish rule - too bad it didn't last! j/k), and indeed Anne-Marie. There are no Dietrichs in Denmark, though; that's German. Hans is common (as in Hans Christian Andersen; until not so long ago, Hans-Christian was a quite common Danish double name), but not quite as common as in Germany and Switzerland. As a surname, though, Hansen is one of the absolutely most common ones, together with Nielsen, Jensen, Christensen and indeed my own Sørensen. The Danish equivalent of John Smith is Jens Hansen.
It seems to me, however, that (esp. male) double names are increasingly going out of fashion here.
In Slavic and English-speaking cultures nicknames are very common, but in Denmark they really aren't. Of course parents will affectionately call their kids "honey" and such, but nicknames based on the given name, and used into adulthood, are extremely rare (it wasn't always like that, since many of our names - like Mette/Margrethe - in fact *are* nickname forms, but that way of using names has disappeared). What we sometimes do is to use initials, though. A Hans-Peter is typically called "HP" - at least both of the Hans-Peters I know are. Many names do have nicknames, but they tend to be offensive rather than affectionate, and used for taunting, which of course means that they don't evolve into new forms of proper names.
Well, look at me talking! I'll stop now. :-)
- Tue
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