Matthias

[user1497991256]

Hi, first post on this site! I'm looking for a UK perspective. The background is that I am English but no longer live in the UK. I live in a Nordic country with my partner (who is a native of that country) and our daughter. We're a couple of months away from having our second child and I'd ideally like to name him something that is not too much bother for British people since obviously my whole family and many of my friends are English (and monolingual).

We have no plans to move to the UK ever (although I suppose you never know), so it's not really the end of the world if it's a bit tricky, but of course we are a bilingual family and I'd like my children to feel at home in both cultures. I also think it would be very unfair on my family to choose a name they would struggle with, but I don't want to ask them because we keep the naming process private. Our daughter has a name that is quite popular and well-known in both countries, pronounced exactly the same. We use the standard spelling for our country which is one letter different from the standard English spelling and so sometimes people spell it slightly wrong, but that doesn't really bother me. Everyone in England recognises it and pronounces it easily, which I really like. Our children's last names are very challenging for anyone outside our country, so I feel the first name at least should be accessible!

We were thinking maybe Matthias for this boy. What do you think? Is it a pretty simple name in your opinion? The pronunciation we are using is (approximately) MAH-tee-us but I know there are a lot of variants on this name throughout Europe so just wondering how this would work out in a UK context? I'm sure some corrections are pretty much unavoidable but there are not many names that we both like and would be even slightly viable for my family/friends. I hate the muh-THY-us pronunciation but I think that's more of an American thing?

Also, do you like the name in general for a Nordic/English boy?

Lovely name means Gift of God very cross cultural name seems to tick all the boxes for you so I say go for it!

Mathias is a great name, think no further.😄

*Matthias 😊

Lovely name.

I admit I'd instinctively pronounce it the way you don't like, but once corrected to your way I'd get it right.

It's a beautiful name

I like it. I would instinctively pronounce it Mat-tee-us if I saw it written (I'm English)

I love this name...its my sons name, I chose it because my great grandfather was Danish and it was one of his names. My ds doesn't like it very much and uses Matthew instead. Im hoping he will like it eventually. He actually wants to be called Dicken, I have no idea why Dicken is acceptable but Matthias is not.

I really like it, but I'd instinctively pronounce it ma-TEE-us rather than MAH-tee-us.

I like it but I'd say MaTHYus as I know one. And personally prefer that pronunciation but each to their own.

I love it, I would say MAH-tee-us automatically. I have a Mateus (Mah-tay-os), we don't live in England either and are English/Brazilian, it works brilliantly. We do have to pronounce it for some people because they automatically call him MAH-tee-us and because he looks very Scandinavian. My mother occasionally calls him Matthew, but she gets my name wrong as well, so meaningless really . Great name, go for it.

I love it pronounced any way and it is a lovely international choice for a family like yours, but there are a lot of potential pronunciations. I do think it would be frequently pronounced differently from the way you'd like, so I'd think about how much that is likely to bother you.

Hopefully, it's an unusual enough name that most people won't have a fixed pronunciation in their heads so will use your preferred one once they know your son, but thinking about all the situations in life when people will either not know him that well or be reading the name for the first time and will get it wrong, I think it could get really tiresome correcting people all the time.

I love it, I wanted Tobias or Mathias for our baby but my husband said no :(

I love it. There's a boy in dd's nursery with that name and i always think how nice it is. Go for it

I also pronounce it Ma-thyas.

Perfect name!

MammieBear - The meaning is actually a minor downside for me as I'm not religious in the slightest (and neither is DP). I tend to think it's OK though as it's not a 'transparent' meaning and a lot of people have no idea what it means. At least I don't think anyone will assume we're Christian because we used a Biblical name - they are so common!

Odin - How odd! I get Matthew (I love Matthew as well, although it wouldn't work for us) but Dicken does seem like a peculiar thing to want to be called. Oh well, I suppose he can always change it if he feels the same way when he's 18!

PicaPau - Nice to hear of another bicultural family using a 'Mat name'. I love almost all the international variants of Matthew and they do tend to transfer well, don't they?

Jooni - Yes, that's my main concern. Although we don't live in the UK - we are only there on visits/holidays. So there's not going to be any problems for him at school, the doctor's office, etc etc unless he chooses to emigrate as an adult. There is only one valid spelling/pronunciation where we live so I know for certain that the name won't cause problems in his day-to-day life for as long as he stays here. I suppose it is always possible that there will be some sort of disaster here that makes a move back to Britain attractive, but the way things are now our lives are very much here.
I suppose I just don't want it to be an issue for family and I don't want him to feel too much like a 'foreigner' in the UK as even though it won't be home for him he will be half-English and I'd like my kids to identify with their background. Just from hearing her first name, you'd think my daughter was a typical British child as her name is not at all unusual in the UK and in fact quite common for girls her age.
I know Matthias does not have the same effect but I think it might be as close as we can get without picking something one of us doesn't like! I suppose he could always call himself Matt or Mattie in English-speaking contexts?

Thanks for the feedback everyone! There were a few others on my list that might be a bit easier (e.g. Johann, Benedikt, Emil) but most of them have been rejected by DP for one reason or another! Plus some others that I think would be just as tricky or trickier. And he tends to suggest things that would be a real mouthful for my parents so I feel I have to reject them even when I really like them, as I just don't think it's fair to choose a name the grandparents can't say. Bilingual naming can be pretty restrictive!