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Baby names

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A girl...with a boy's middle name?

33 replies

MrsPotatohead1 · 04/12/2014 20:41

Hi, what do you all think of a pretty girl name with the middle name James?

E.g. Elizabeth James... (Not our name choice)

I really like the sound to it, plus it's DH's name... Here in Wales it is popular to use the father's first name as the child's surname, e.g. Cadi Rhys...

OP posts:
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EeekNumber4 · 08/12/2014 13:34

My grandma was given a boys middle name and has hated it and been embarrassed by it all her life. Personally I wouldn't do it but if you feel strongly about it then I think you should do what you want.

DuploChaos · 08/12/2014 13:47

You say it's not your name choice, so why are you doing it?

skylark2 · 08/12/2014 19:21

A family name as a middle name is really common - especially if it's James, since that is such a common surname.

JemimaMuddledUp · 08/12/2014 19:32

I was going to say that this is really common in Wales. I like it.

mathanxiety · 08/12/2014 22:15

I know girls named Rebecca James and Daphne Michael..

lardylump · 08/12/2014 22:19

my dd has a male middle name but we left off the e to make it the female version. doesnt affect the pronunciation

she loves it and she knows it was someone who meant a lot to me

mathanxiety · 08/12/2014 22:27

Flora and Katie -- my mum's parents (in Ireland) used a family hierarchy system to name their children: first boy, grandad's father, first girl, grandad's mother; second boy and girl, named after grandad's aunt and uncle from whom he inherited the farm as they were childless and he had worked it since age 14 alongside his uncle; third boy, granny's long dead father, third girl, granny's long dead mother (she was orphaned at a young age); remaining two children (boys), brothers of grandad's as granny had lost touch with her biological relatives.

The normal custom in their neck of the woods was to use first the father's parents' names, then the mother's parents' names, and other family names from each side once there were two girls and two boys, or while waiting for two of each. They adapted the custom to their own circumstances.

Names in that particular area tended to come from a fairly small pool of names, though within that pool there were some that are unusual. So you would have Michael, James, Patrick, John, Brigid, Anne/Anna, Mary, Margaret and the like, and then names like Laserian, Moling, Anastatia and Moses.

mathanxiety · 08/12/2014 22:34

In Connemara, lineage names are used, with the genitive case used for second and third, fourth, etc. names.

So you would have someone named Jude Phaidi Mhairtin, 'Jude the son of Paidi the son of Mairtin'.

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