AIBU to wonder about names in the past.

Definitely the case in my very large family. Weirder still, my grandad had two sisters who both had the same first name. They lived to quite an old age and were both known by other names, which weren’t even their middle names

My Mum and her siblings were all known by their middle name. When my Mum was in hospital, the nurse said “She doesn’t seem to know her name.” They had been calling her Jane, which was her first name. When I explained, the nurse unhelpfully put on the board above her bed “Likes to be known as Yetta.” She didn’t like to be known as Yetta, it was her name!

Women in my family, on my Mum’s side were all called Frieda, Aydel, Elza, Minna and Yetta. Thankfully dropped for my generation! They also changed a German surname for a French one, despite living in UK. My Mum’s theory was that they were obviously foreign, and probably better to be thought to be French than German.

As an aside on this topic, Queen Victoria had at least seven granddaughters given her name as their first or their "official" name, and many had nicknames or used another name later (notably after she died some dropped the Victoria or double-barreled it!)
Victoria of Prussia, known as "Vicky" or "Moretta"
Victoria of Wales, known as "Toria"
Victoria of Hesse, the only one invariably known as...Victoria.
Victoria Melita of Edinburgh (known as "Ducky")
Helena-Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein, known as "Thora" (and always called just Princess Victoria as a child; she added her own mother's name later)
Victoria Patricia of Connaught, known as "Patsy" - after 1901 called just Princess Patricia.
Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg, known in family by her fourth name, Ena.

Same thing going on in other, less obvious families.
Confusingly,Victoria of Prussia's first name of the string was Frederike, but she never known this way... and she had an older sister whose first name at christening was Victoria, but was always known publicly and privately as Charlotte.

Having read the thread, it's disturbing how many mumsnetters can't recognize a joke when they see it! FFS!

I've seen it suggested that Queenie was a nickname for Victoria - but of course this could vary by generation! If born in the 1920s one might well be called Queenie if christened Mary, I suppose..

If someone was in service their name would be changed if another staff member already had that name. So that could stick too. Plus a lot of affectionate names , eg ‘pet names’ are now used as stand alone names so we forget that they are the informal form. Sadie (real name Sarah) being one. Meg, Maggie, Peggy, May (all for Margaret). Harry (Henry). I think Queenie may have also been for Margaret or Mary.

Two of my great-aunts were known by their middle names. In the case of the eldest it was because she had been given her mother's name as a first name - a common enough scenario. But hardly anyone knew this was her first name until I found it on the census taken when she was a toddler. In the other case I have no idea hwy they preferred the middle name, except that her first name was hideous! It wasn't a family one or anything.

On the other side of the family among my great-great-aunts there was one whose parents gave her a massive and pretentious string of names, and always called her by the third name, which was a diminutive of her grandmother's. This again was a fact lost to later generations until it emerged in family research. She was the black sheep of the family and had vanished from the public record until it suddenly occurred to me to search under her third name, which I'd seen used on an old version of the family tree. Another sister seemed to swap her own names around freely, giving them in random order on different censuses. I believe she was known by the original first name, so why she later used this as second I've no idea. Perhaps she was calling herself by the second name at that stage.
Finally, their youngest sister used a diminutive form throughout her life. She was christened by a formal name (in honour of family) but the nickname turns up on every other doc every written, including her death certificate.

The vast majority of people in WW2 were not given fake names. Anyone who has even dabbled in family history or watched a single episode of who do you think you are knows that.

SOME intelligence officers (spies) would use a fake name just as they do nowadays. And there is some evidence that people in the Army with Germanic sounding surnames would change them to more English sounding surnames. But the idea that everyone got a new name is just nonsense.

Everyone ?

My grandfather (born 1895) was Herbert, always known as Bertie. Apparently his friends called him Tim. I have no idea why.

The other grandfather and both grandmothers were always known by their proper names.

There was someone in the wider family of that generation whose real name I don’t remember but it might have been something like Victoria Elizabeth so she was always known as Queenie.

Same here. I always thought my mum was Maggie as that's what my dad and her parents and siblings called her. It was a bit of a shock to find out she was actually called Iris. Likewise, my maternal Grandmother was called Mary to her family and my Grandad. I only found out when researching the family tree that her real name was Elizabeth. The girls in my family going back generations (my sister and I included) weren't given middle names; only the boys!

My granny was one of more than a dozen born between 1905 and 1930 as far as I am aware they're all known by their given names or common diminutives. But my mum did have about 6 Aunty Mary's and Uncle John's because serval uncles married Marys and several aunts married John's so they were all referred to in the family by slightly odd identifiers like Mary one eye (she had both eyes but a one eyed cat) John blue door (painted the house door a very vivid blue) Mary next door (an uncle married the girl next door). Until you get it into your head who everyone is it's completely surreal, especially as the John or Mary often get dropped so it's just Aunty one eye or Uncle next door.

you definitely did have people named after celebrities etc in the time period you are talking about, look at the explosion of girls named 'Victoria' etc when before her the name wasn't known in the UK. While not celebrities exactly there are also things like people being named 'Jubilee' around the time of the, well, Jubilee etc.

Obviously it wasn't to the same scale as is done now but was a 'thing.'

Still waiting for the 'everyone in the second world war had fake names' bullshitter poster to come back with evidence for that!

At least 4 generations on my Dad's side the eldest sons had the same first and middle name. They alternated between using middle and first names. Second sons also had the same name as each other. So my dad's uncle and brother had the same name: one used a shortened version. And when you got to cousins same pattern.

My gran (born in the 1910s) was called Sarah, but always went with her middle name, Maud! Apparently everyone but family knew my aunt by her middle name rather than her first name, and my mum has gone by a completely random nickname given to her by colleagues since the age of about 17!

My father was born in 1920 and he was always known by his middle name by everyone, ever since he was a young boy. People were often surprised when they saw his initials written down.

I think his actual first name was given because he had an uncle called that, but presumably that wasn't what his parents really wanted to call him!

I am pretty sure that all / most of his brothers were known by middle names too. No idea whether this was for the same reason. None of them left alive now to ask obviously

Both my maternal grandparents had different names to their birth names. No idea about my paternal grandparents.

But there were also lots of the same surname — that’s my point. If there are five John Smiths in the same small village, they need distinguishing in some way. I mean, that’s how surnames originally evolved. John (the) Smith was distinguished from John (the) Carter, and big John Long from dark-haired John Black etc,

People were simply far less focused on naming their children as any kind of exercise in originality. Many just used family names already in circulation, and often the first several children were named after the grandparents, anyway, so any kind of ‘free’ choice would come quite far down the line. I mean, this isn’t centuries ago! My siblings and I were born between 1972 and 1982 and my sister is named after my mother, both first and middle name, and my brother has the same name as my dad and his dad, who lived with us, so a lot of people with the same names lived in our house at the same time. Only after the first three children did my parents start using non-family names.

That's very similar for Tanni Grey-Thompson. When she was born, her (toddler) older sister tried to refer to the new baby as 'tiny' but couldn't quite pronounce it properly, so she became 'Tanni' - although her actual birth name was Carys!

There's also a woman who has appeared on countless TV gameshows who goes by the name 'Pooey' - and I gather that came from similar origins. I suppose it's helped her along, though, as when producers are looking for distinctive characteristics, quirks and funny stories amongst thousands of contestants applying to go on the show and hoping to win big, the heavy lifting has already been done for them!

I remember somebody on an old MN thread who knew of a family of 5 young men - and all of them were given Mary as their confirmation name!

Good points... but I wonder where that sprang from? Considering that, back then, it would be automatic for women to take their DH's surname, then all the children would have the same surname; so surely that was the unifying factor within families?

Maybe there were social 'customs' that we're no longer aware of - whereby you had to give your child one of a very few 'approved' names or be shunned and ridiculed - and calling your child an ordinary name, but not one that was ordinary/in longtime usage for your particular family, was heavily frowned on? Maybe even something like William was considered the equivalent of 'chavvy' if his dad, uncles and grandad were all called John?

It's an interesting one about the custom of recycling names for future babies after losing them, as in our day, I think most people would consider that diminishing the memory of the original one. Very different if you name your new baby after her much-loved DGM who recently died after a long, productive life. Maybe they just did the whole 'honouring' thing but in the same generation?

My mother is Irish and came from a family of 12 children. 3 of the 5 girls had the name Mary (albeit one as only a middle name). Alternative names were a necessity.

This is so true - so many mums wanting to give their child a perfectly reasonable name that they love, but NOT actually wanting to officially give them that name, as they don't think it's grand or 'proper' enough!!

"Does 'Jack' work as an everyday nickname for Ptolomy-Polonius?"

I too find this fascinating. My Edwardian grandmother was Hilda Mary, but everyone called her Jane. She hated ‘Hilda’, and claimed that Jane was her middle name. It wasn’t.

Where I live, there is a substantial elderly population and many, perhaps even most, are known by their middle names rather than their first names (I know this because my voluntary job involves some name related admin). No one seems to know why, it’s just the tradition or the convention as a hangover from Edwardian or pre-war times I guess..

My grandmother was known by the name that apparently was her older brother’s choice of name for her rather than her what her parents actually named her.
The other thing I don’t quite understand is diminutives that don’t quite make sense (even though I know they’re accepted diminutives), why does Margaret become Peggy or what’s the point of making 1 syllable, 4 letters of John into 1 syllable and 4 letters of Jack?