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Hannele is the spelling I'm most used to. It is pronounced with three syllables.

Hannalie, Hannelie or Hanlie are all possible; I haven't seen your other suggestions but except for the ones with a -u- and a double -ee they could happen. (The -u- spelling couldn't for phonetic reasons. You probably heard the name, and the Afrikaan,s a sounds pretty much like the short English u; however, the Afrikaans u is different and wouldn't work. The double vowel ee, like all double vowels in Afrikaans, is a diphthong - the vowel sound, long, ending with a schwa or neutral vowel.) The -ie ending is more Afrikaans, the -i more German or international-trendy: both would sound the same and could be used.

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It's a blended name, and an exact duplicate of Annelie: Anne or Anna or Hanna (the usual spelling in Afrikaans, rather than Hannah, and this is an Afrikaans name) plus Elizabeth.

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There used to be a very strong tradition of naming children after their grandparents: this is fading now, but it used to result in whole batches of cousins having identical names. Blending names was a way around this problem: you still honoured your grandparents, but gave your child something different from her/his relations.

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This practice was mostly a girl-naming activity, though I do know a man named Andries Petrus who is always known as Rusandre.

As South Africa is a multicutural society it would be helpful if you had some information about who is usually named this. Is it commonly used by English-speaking South Africans? Or by Afrikaans-speaking South Africans? Or by South Africans who speak a Bantu language (like Zulu or Xhosa)?

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Is the name masculine or feminine?

This message was edited 7/2/2010, 12:51 AM