Some European countries are big on what I call Name Lists. These are actual or social lists of acceptable names that you can give children. I don’t really understand how the system works, but it leads, inevitably, to Name Day. Each name on the List is assigned a date, and when your Name Day comes around, you get to celebrate. It’s like a birthday, except the names are literally printed on the calendar, so it’s even more convenient. All great, unless you’re a foreign object like me, in which case you’re denied a Name Day. No cake for you. It’s not a big deal, but I think there should at least be one day for people who aren’t on the List. We could call it Leftovers Day. You know, where all the expat kids get together and celebrate that their names are historically meaningless.
On the bright side, as an American, you can name your own kids anything you like…though I think strange names are becoming more and more common. My aunt is an elementary teacher, and in recent years she’s had a Dude, a Cozy and a Mercedes. There is, of course, the celebrity influence: actresses get creative and bear Apples, and surely such things trickle down to the rest of society. But in some cases, I think crazy names are a way of exercising liberty, making a statement, and/or forcing uniqueness. I will name my son Dude because I can. I will spell my daughter’s name Tlouixtescsrhfur because it will make her (and me) stand out in the crowd. Welcome to the land of the free. Land of people who can (and do – true story) name their children Merry Christmas and Aryan Nation. Yikes.
My in-laws are completely floored by this whole concept. Repeatedly. It has even turned into a real name game of sorts. Here’s how it starts: they point to something. Couch? Yes, in America you can call your child couch. Then they roar with laugher. What about bag? Can you call your child bag? Yep. More laughter. It goes on like this. It’s pretty funny for me too, because this whole exchange is in German. You really could call your kid Tasche, and for non-Germans, it would even sound reasonable. (I actually kind of like it.) This brings me to another game my husband and I play. We imagine naming our kids something totally ridiculous that only has meaning in one language…and then never telling anyone. Of course we would never do this, but we think it’s hilarious to discuss the possibilities. Already, when we refer to our future first child (yet nonexistent, so don’t get too excited Mom!), we call him or her Parkoló [Házban]. It sounds like an exotic twist on Parker, but it is Hungarian for “parking garage.”
In Germany the Name List is quite long, but my sense is that it is pretty short in Poland and Hungary. Everyone has one of thirty or so first names, and there aren’t so many last names either, so the permutations are limited. Good luck, then, with your Google stalking. In some ways, it might seem like Poland was doing us all a favor by offering a limited set of options, because the names are so hard to pronounce. (Wrap your American accent around “Przemslaw,” for example). But it’s a trick! As mentioned here, in Poland, the names change according to familiarity. So you’ll meet a Malgorzata, who later you can call Malgosia, and in the end goes by Gosia. Similarly, Aleksandra = Ola. This is totally confusing, but I love it.
The last thing I’ll mention about Europe’s Name Lists is that they are chock full of real, usually Christian, people: saints and such. A name can therefore be easily translated into another language that has the same person on its List. So Gosia might introduce herself in English as Margaret. That’s name number four for our friend Marge. As for us innovative Americans, for the most part, we are who we are no matter where we live. (Don’t get me started on Jorge and George.) That means Dude is still cool, even in Europe.
Hey Dude: happy Leftovers Day.
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You are cracking me up with this. I teach in a low-income school in Denver and we have a large hispanic population. Many of our kids not only have names that can be pronounced two or three different ways (Joel…I’ll let you figure that one out.), they also have four or five names. Take for example Jose Manuel Silerio Yanez. Do you call him Jose Silerio? Jose Silerio-Yanez or Jose Yanez. It is still a mystery to me. We also can’t forget that Alexis (a boy) is often called Alex and Alejandro can sometimes be called Alex and of course Alexander is called Alex as well. Oh yeah, and Frasisco is called Paco (that one stumps me too).
Maybe it is just in America that we are called what our parents named us?
Thanks for sharing this European tradition that I had NO idea about! It is very interesting…
I always find it interesting when you post stuff like this. I have a friend who’s an Anglican priest (from England) and he and his wife celebrate the “name days” of their two kids, Dominic and Felicity every year. Basically, I think they’re celebrating the respective Saints Feast Days, but he always makes it sound big and important
Am I on the list?
I don’t have any strange names in my class this year; however, I do have 3 Emma’s, 2 Natalies, and 2 Christians. That’s a third of my class that shares a name with another student in the same class. Really, they couldn’t have broken up the “doubles” and “triples” amongst all three 6th grade classrooms?
I’m fascinated by this name list and might do a bit more research myself!
My name day is March 17th. That is if my real name was Gertrud.
I think that is close enough and I will celebrate. It is also St. Patrick’s Day.
I love presents!
Girls please mark this on your calendar.
Love, Mom
Anything for some cake, Mom. Anything for cake.
Cake- I was thinking gifts!
However some strange sounding names are pretty old. Spanish Mercédès (’[Maria] de las Mercedes’ )was not only used by Bizet (in Carmen) but also was the name of daughter of car producer representative (Daimler-Motoren) .
. But the old custom and tradition was , that either you took the name exactly like the name of the Saint relevant for this day (challenging , especially when boy was born and in calendar there was only names for girls. or vice versa)
Nowadays laso here one can select for the baby any name they like (almost. They can name girl Mercedes but there can be problems with .. Audi
or other ones but only from the days (”list”) which were after the day of birthday. It means, that for example child born on August 15 could be named Maria or with the name being in calendar between August 16 – December 31.