Are we due a revival of obscure Victorian names?

[Delphigirl]

Just reading something where the protagonist is Alfrida. Her brother is Kenelm. I am really feeling both of them. I tried to persuade a niece to call her new son Sylvester a few months ago and I’m still feeling cross she didn’t leap on it. Is the zeitgeist moving towards these long-ignored names? Or maybe it is just me.
Let me know what names you would revive and please please if anyone has used a name like this recently would you share? I would LOVE to know.

And yet you still get kids called Tristan.

Blodwyn!

I think of a cartoon cat too but with huge muscles!

I LOVE Kenelm. As a child I lived close to a church with that name and was told the story of Saint Kenelm, I always loved the name and wanted it for a son with the NN Kenny. DH wouldn’t let me :(.

Nooooooo I never associated Tristan with sorrow! You are right! I’ve always hated Dolores as a depressing name for that reason..

I remember many years ago reading that Murder was once a girl's name!! I can't for the life of me remember where I saw that though.

Probably best not to bring that one back either. 🤣

I do love some of these historic names and some are still in use today, standing the test of time.

I know a real life, live Athelstan.
Jimberly is a fantastic name.

You were a trailblazer with a sadly unappreciative husband. My condolences 😜

I may have used one of those for my own ds

I’m willing to bet it isn’t Waldo 😉

Ooh yes. I used to walk through the village graveyard when my kids were small and loved the name Aquilla found on one of the headstones.
In my family tree there’s a particular love for military first names - Sargent, Colonel etc

What was the Keira Knightly movie where it was a period drama based on real life and she lived with her bastard DH and his mistress and I think she has to give up a baby and cries in a carriage in the rain??? Anyway, the kids name was Harrio, short for Harriet 🥹

(It was a good movie. Top typecasting for KK - lots of opportunities for anguished teeth)

Makes me think of Clement Attlee.

Think it was called Duchess. There is a Spencer connection I think.

I like Zillah (character in Wuthering Heights).

Boris Johnson has Wilfred and Lettice. I think that would probably put me off.

Esther was quite popular in Victorian times. I’m quite relieved I didn’t get called that as it was on the list of family names.

DH had a great uncle Clarence and there had I think been a few Clarences. Antonia and Anthony crop up a lot too

There's a resurgence of Victorian names already. I know of a couple of Alices and Elizas. I think that we're due for a revival of 50s and 60s name such as - Susan, Linda, David, John etc.

I used to work with a Blodwyn who would be late forties now.

In my Victorian family tree there are a couple of Zipporahs. Also several Appolonias.

I’d like to see the old religious name like Concepta, immaculata, Assumpta, Magella, Ignatius

Endeavour (Morse) A PF Gregory character, Philadelphia

Oh the nuns, the nuns, put a "Sister," before all those names lol. I knew a Concepta from Virginia. How we laughed.

Oh and what about Gobnait. O'Lunacy?

Some of those are still used. Come to a multicultural Catholic parish. I know children & young adults called Ignatius, Aloysius, Assumpta, Ambrose, Clement, Ursula, Augustine (and Augustina), Jerome ...

Blodwyn is a Welsh name, isn’t it?

I think there may have been a fashion for German girls names before WW1. I have a Trudie and a Hilda in my family tree. Expect the trend dropped off pretty quickly come 1914, I wonder if those names will revive?

i know 2 Gobnait’s. Fairly popular in West Cork