What's the story behind your name?

[LetThereBeRock]

Were you named for a relative?,a celebrity?,a character from a novel? or did your parents just like the sound of the name?

wuggle, lovely that your parents kept your original name as a middle. My mother was adopted and it was only when she finally got hold of her original birth certificate that she realised her parents had kept both the names her biological mother used - she'd always wondered why she had two middle names. Still a lovely thing for them to do, especially as in those days there was a hell of a stigma about adoption (because of being born out of wedlock) to the point where they never told her she was adopted.

I am named after my granny (maternal). Except no-one ever called her by her real name, she was known as Bunt for some reason. I like my name even if it is a little old-fashioned and I like the link with my granny who I miss.

My DM's mother decided that I should be called Jo-Anna before I was born, and as DM was so sure I was going to be a boy called James, she let her run with the idea after a very long labour and assisted delivery, she apparently took one look at my very squashed wee person and said 'oh my God, Helen' and it stuck. She has no idea where the name came from, as she knew no one with that name, and it wasn't 'popular' at the time (Early 1980s)
My DB born 2 years later was called James.
My DD's middle name is the same as her Godmother/ my best friend from school, I have no idea how I choose her 1st name - it wasn't on any lists before she was born lol

I'm boring, my name was chosen because my Mum liked it.

I do have a friend whose brother was named after a brand of childrens' vest though.

The man in my life got to chose his daughter's name. He chose to call her after one of his ex-girlfriends. No prizes for guessing that he never dared admit that to his wife!

*the man in my life got to chOOse, sorry.

My mother tells me I'm named after one of the geese in The Aristocats. The cartoon film from 1970. Yes, named after a goose! My middle name is my maternal grandmother's name. She died a few years before I was born.
I like both names very much.

dead russian girl whose diary recounting the deaths of her fmaily during ww2 was in a museum which my parents visited in moscow or somewhere in russia

I have no clue why my incredibly staid parents picked the name they did for me. Just grateful they added a nice boringly common middle name so I could switch when I left home.

DH also uses his middle name for totally different reason - there were four with the same first name in his first school class and they ran out of variations so he switched!

DS has a well-known Biblical first name we just liked (nobody else in family is called it) with a family surname as a middle, which is also his grandad's middle. between them he could be called by six variants so will hopefully find one he likes!

Friend of mine was named after an elephant. Apparently in 1969 the Russians sent an elephant over from Moscow Zoo to London Zoo, it was in all the papers, and her parents just liked the name. (NOT Nelly, btw!)

I was named after a Beatrix Potter character(well, the spelling of my name was)and also the middle name of a famous illustrator.

I was going to be called Lydia (a name I really like) but my parents said people would keep saying "lid of ya dustbin"

vintage, is your name Miss Tiggywinkle? Or Nutkin?

My Mother was named after the heroine Grace Darling (Darling being her middle name) My eldest daughter was named after a yacht! My next daughter was named after a character from a Russian Novel, and we just liked my youngest daughters name. I have the middle name of my maternal grandmother who died many years before I was born

My name was plucked out of that week's TV Times. Shows what a lowbrow household I came from. My middle name is the same as 96% of girls born in 1978.

I was very nearly named Regan after the possessed child in the Exorcist. Groovy.

Apparently I wasn't named for a couple of weeks (my mother had told nobody she was pregnant, so I was a surprise to say the least)

My mum wanted to name me after her best friend, but Dad said that no child of his was going to be named after a nut (Hazel).

My brother (aged 9) chose my middle name.

My mum wanted to call me Marie but my Dad being a Scouser pronounced it 'Maarreee' which she hated, so Marie became my middle name and they went with a scottish name they both liked (scottish surname so it went better and I hate Marie tbh).

lol itsonly - Marie is MY middle name too

(and at my wedding in Zim the vicar prouncouned it "maaarreee"..........which is actually a Shona word for "money" haha)

My sister who was 6 1/2 got to name me, I hate my name.

According to my mother I'm not named after anyone...

However my first name is, an admittedly anglicised, diminutive of my maternal great grandmothers name. She was Irish.

My middle name just happens to be my mother's favourite aunts name.

I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

The story for my sister is similar. Her first name is the a diminutive of the name we used for my mother's (first and very precious) car. It is a proper name. She isn't called datsun or something really wacky. Her middle name is the proper form of my father's favourite great aunts name.

Don't know what happened with my brother. His first name is biblical and has no family connections and the middle is terrible and has sexual connotations that my mother didn't know about. My father let her use it because he thought it was funny ;-) Poor brother.

Interestingly he has "allowed" most of his friends to think his name is something quite different. An imperial roman name (shortened to his "real " name) and a very trad scots name. It is really quite funny. My mother likes the new version better now that she is aware of the connotations behind his middle name.

My youngest brother was born the same year that Back to the Future came out. His name? You guessed it; Marty. Which, unfortunately, when said in a southern English accent sounds incredibly camp and out of place.

My own names have no interesting story; my Dad simply said to my Mum "I've always wanted a daughter called x" and she agreed. So dull.

I have a nice story behind mine - at the end of WWII, my Gran took in a Holocaust survivor refugee and they became best of friends (my Granddad was made to stay in Europe to help with rebuilding, etc., as he was v good with languages). He returned in 47, my Mum was born in 48 (9 months later ). The family friend lived with them until @1954 and absolutely doted on my Mum. Because of her experiences, she couldn't have children and never married. On my Mum's 9th birthday, she remembers picking some flowers for her 'Aunty' and deciding that when she grew up, she would have a little girl and give her Aunty's name.

And she did! Lucky my Dad loved the name too and his father was Jewish, so he liked that link and thus my parents didn't discuss any other names. I love it as well (is uncommon but everyone has heard of it).

My middle name is Louise, because it was the law in the 1970s that all girls had that as their middle name, including girls with Louise as their first name too - I bet Getorf's middle name is Louise too!

My DP's little brother has Oliver as a middle name because when he was born, my DP apparently became obsessed with Oliver Twist and kept having meltdowns about wanting his little brother to be called Oliver Twist! They gave him DP's middle name as his first to try to placate DP.

I have the same name as my Mum, but because her parents and brother/sister were deaf, they called her by a middle name, she is still known by that name today. She found out when she was 16 about her real first name and that it was from a family friend.

When I came along, my parents settled on my name, it's very unique. Then, I gave it to my DD1 as a middle name. So as far as we know (and we've researched it lots!), there are only 4 of us in existence, one of which sadly passed away a few years ago (the family friend).

If I google it, it comes up with a sea molusc lol!! Apparently it's Irish and derives from the name of a county but we don't know anything else... Do I say what my name is on here? Have only read OP...

First name is because my parents liked it, second name is in memory of my uncle's labrador dog that my mother loved as a child.