To not understand why people call their baby...

[smellfunny]

Not to be goady, but I don't understand why people give their babies names with negative connotations or meanings. Examples from the top of my head being:

Cain (murdered his brother in Old Testament)
Hector (hector also being a synonym for bullying someone)
Tristan (this one is a bit contentious because it can either mean 'tumult' or correspond to 'sadness')

Is it just that people don't think about the meanings behind the names? Feel free to add more names to the list...

Bonus name: 'Claudia' coming from the Latin word for 'lame'. I gave this one a pass because it's so established and the connotation is generally unknown...

The whole no limb thing is terrifying. I would be horrified if I googled my name and that came up
Really? I wouldn't give a single solitary fuck. Though I can't really imagine googling my name in the first place.

No, i wouldn't wonder why someone had chosen a mythical character who had met an unfortunate end, because they pretty much all have - that's the nature of them. I would smile wryly if i met a little boy called Orion and introduce him to my DD who is called Artemis.

Lots of parents never read a baby name book.

Courtney means short nose I think.

Anastasia is ruined by the murdered Russian princess and 50 shades.

I think Teresa will be unpopular for a while.

I wouldn't give a single solitary fuck. Though I can't really imagine googling my name in the first place

And that is how parents chose names with horrible meanings. They hadn't botherd doing a bit of research on them.

My son is called Tristan. He's named after DH's childhood dog.

He's the least sad child ever. I think it means 'noisy' which is about right

Artemis is one of my favourite names but didn’t work at all with our surname.

As to Orion it was one of my fav names as a child, but Ford Orion did for it.

Yeah etymology is just like horoscopes, which is why dictionaries don’t exist and people read their monthly definitions in the DM.

But the meanings are to a certain extent meaningless. They have no purpose other than what night be vaguely interesting history, they don't determine the character of the child.

I wouldn't for a second dismiss Tristan because of what may or may not be a meaning and from what I've seen on this thread, that meaning is possibly under dispute. I'd associate it with a lovely one I knew and have positive reaction to it.

Yes Flavia, they are just an interesting story. I always joke that my parents looked at me and thought 'ah yes, prophet of doom'. It's a joke because they obviously didn't. They thought - like everyone does - 'here is my precious daughter whom i love most in the world and we are going to name her a name we love' and also to them personally 'which to us has a very interesting and romantic story'. No one meets me and thinks i'm going to start foretelling destruction. In fact the main comments i had were enquiries to where Rodney was But thankfully that has ceased.

It's a theme which speaks to a lot of people, hence why we really feel for characters like Sarah Conner in Terminator 2, or Ripley in Aliens. These are strong women who have the burden of knowledge yet no one believes them. When thinking of the story i am often reminded of the film the Mothman prophecies, where the being warning them is likened to a window cleaner at the top of a skyscraper. They can see an accident coming and warn people, but they cannot affect it. It is an inevitability which people find fascinating and why these stories are retold.

I think there are two kinds of name "Meanings"

There's the "interesting story" meaning.

Then there 's the "it will make people think of" meaning, where it's associated with a famous person or event.

For the first meaning, Adolf means noble wolf.
For the second, Adolf is Hitler.

For the first meaning, Claudia means lame.
For the second it's either nothing at all or perhaps Claudia Schiffer.

I would let the second kind of meaning influence my choice, but not the first.

I think I understand it perfectly well.

Well, I suggested that you didn't because you said, who cares what supposed meaning somebody made up a gazillion years ago.

Your use of the word 'supposed' suggests that you don't actually believe that these are the actual meanings of words. You also think that people 'made these meanings up' which was why I said you don't understand how word and name derivation works. Nobody 'made up' that the word Claudia means 'lame' for example. It comes from the Latin word 'claudus' meaning lame. Its use as a name, however, I assume comes more from its being a common Roman name in the form Claudius (Claudia being the feminine). Suggesting that people made up the meaning for names is working backwards. It was in fact the names themselves that were 'made up' a
gazillion years ago' from vocabulary at the time in most instances. Some names for sure are not certain in their origin. In my experience, websites will then make up a meaning for them or state as fact a meaning which is only suggested. This is 'making up the meaning of names'.
You don't have to care what names mean or what their origins are - that is your prerogative - but it doesn't mean that
it still is utter bollocks

I know two Orions.

My name means 'Christmas Born' but I wasn't born anywhere near Christmas, sure my parents never even thought about what the name meant when they chose (my dad had picked it up long before I was even a twinkle in his eye - he had decided he was either going to marry someone with my name or have a daughter with my name)

Every time someone types Orion I read Onion.....

I used to call one of those Orions 'onion' a lot.

Onion is making me laugh. I don't know why.

There aren't any vegetable names are there? Except Lettuce.....

That's Lettice.

I know. I was being silly.....

And Cress(ida).

Herb(ert) is basically a vegetable

Very much agree with Trills and SumAndSubstance

Altho I’d argue more than two ‘meanings’ - there can be multiple layers of meaning, narrative and association.

This thread shows some people care about name meaning and some don’t, some care about mythological story behind name and some don’t, some care specifically how the myth ended and some don’t. Some care about later associations. Hitler has put people off Adolf but Stalin has not put people off Joseph.

I enjoy having a name whose meaning is positive as well as being a powerful mythic (and real) figure. But I understand some people don’t care about either.

I care about both etymology and myth but I don’t care how mythic figures died as long as they lived well.

Wrt Tristan - etymologically from Drustan/Drystan and I think the ‘triste’ association is spurious. Drystan pronounced in French sounds almost identical to Tristan, but with a t it’s easier to say. So it’s more likely to be a natural variant. It’s common for similar sounding letters to be substituted when names cross borders. Gwenhwyfar, Guinevere, Jennifer, Ginevra.

It’s unfortunate that Chrysiida ended up as Cressida, I blame Chaucer. Crysos means gold but it’s ended up associated with the slightly odd herb you put in egg sandwiches but what else do you do with?

My ex neighbours named one of their DS's Louis, pronounced Lewis. The mum explained that she couldn't spell it Lewis, as people might think he was named after the jail.

It's not that they hadn't given it any thought, just that their cultural references were/are different to most folk's.

(And, no, I never pointed out that the jail is actually Lewes).

I'm perfectly capable of separating the vast majority of names from alternative uses, or their origins, or associations with negatively viewed people. Cain, Ophelia, Amelia etc. are perfectly acceptable in my eyes. I agree that those clutching pearls at names such as this are being slightly pretentious. It's quite clearly a normal name first, with any negative associations arising secondly for most. I have a friend called Rio, I'm not thinking of Brazil every time I see her. It's just her name. And if I was introduced to Tristan tomorrow, sorrowfulness is hardly going to spring to mind.

I'd only struggle with Candida, Adolf and Lolita.