Well at least he didn't suggest Adolf

[zeegilly]

I'm German. DH is irish.
As surname will be very irish, we have agreed that DCs will get a German first name.
I was thinking a relatively simple German name or a name used in both German and English

DH has come home today after making his shortlist.
But he really thinks that 'the name' is in this list and wants me to put it to you lot.

Please please be honest

Girls

Hedwig
Ebba
Jutta
Ortrun
Elfriede

Boys

Jochim
Bertram
Dietrich
Dietfried
Ekkehard/Eckehard

Renata
Zigmund
Leopold

Love Valentin and Estel.

Another two girls names:
Johanna
Sabine

Kerstin/Kirsten
Niklas/Mathias

From your list...Elfriede or Joachim
The rest suck

Germans living in the uk that I know have called their dc

Fritz
Peter
Catherine

Johanna and Sabine would definitely fall into difficulties with pronunciation, based on my experience - if Johanna (assuming it's pronounced Yohanna) gets called 'Joanna' by all her friends/teachers, will your DH mind?

I also know a Sabine living in the UK who changed the spelling of her name to Sabina because she was so sick of being called 'Sabeen'. Luckily she prefers the spelling 'Sabina' anyway, but having to change the spelling of your name just to make the pronunciation clear is rather a faff!

Deutsche Vornamen Hitliste - als Inspiration, oder zum Vermeiden .

Sorry, didn't mean to be rude: was staring at this German website and typed German before I knew it.
Anyway, there are a few suggestings going back to the Middle Ages to chose from...

What about Hannelore, nn Hanni or Lori

We also need a name that's acceptable German english, but those names are horrible, sorry! I want a name that is written and pronounced the same in each language. That means I vetoed anything beginning with j.

I know a Svenja - no one seems to have trouble with it.
Martin? That works in both.

Hedwig - sorry you are setting the poor child up for years of torment.

When is baby due? Can you hang on until the Olympics and name them after medal winners? So you can at least say "Katerina, as in Katarina Witt" - it is suprising how 'normal' a name is after there has been a famous sports person with it.

Hedwig Goebbels was called Hedda which I actually like and Elfriede is nice

I agree most of those would set them up for a life of being mispronounced horribly if they live in the UK (diet-rich and jutter, anyone?). And Hedwig would get owl teasing as well as mispronunciation.

I do quite like Elfriede/Elfie though, and someone else's suggestion of Verena which is really pretty.

If it has to be obviously German, what about:

Martha (would be pronounced a bit "wrong" here but not as badly)
Kerstin
Agnes
Elspeth
Bettina
Janina
Birgit
Astrid
Sonja

Andreas
Leo
Hendrik
Franz
Holger
Markus (which would have the advantage that he could just shorten it to Mark if he didn't like the attention from having an obviously "foreign" name).

I do think you will need to consider what works with the surname too though, if it is "very Irish" as you say, then combining it with a pointedly German first name could end up sounding like a bit of a made-up "comedy name"... so if it was me I would lean towards something that really works in both languages.

Isolde is a beautiful name but will it go with an irish surname? e.g. Isolde Murphy

Greta
Rudolph (maybe not)

Oh dear...

How about:

Leo (Leopold)
Wolfgang (Wolfie)

Reike (Federieke)
Constance

Svenja is lovely too

I went to school with two families of girls whose fathers had been German refugees. They had very German surnames and perfectly nice Irish first names. I know this is in reverse, but the juxtaposition never raised an eyebrow. I also have two cousins who have children with German names (German partners) and again the mix of names is really not that strange to my ears. Plus a German aunt who used her married name along with her very German first name ans strong German accent for sixty years in rural Ireland. Another family I knew i school had an Irish surname (a Mac- name) and Italian first names (Italian mother) -- but then maybe Irish people are a bit more relaxed about non-matchy names, indicated by the eagerness of the DH in this case to use German names for his children.

I knew an Iseult [very Irish name beginning with K] in school too. And a Berthold [very Irish surname] was a neighbour. Murphy might sound like a quintessentially Irish name that wouldn't go with anything but Biddy or Paddy but Irish families with the surname Murphy use all sorts of first names without batting an eye.

I've never come across Janina before and I must say I really like it! Much nicer than Janine.