Can we triple barrel our child's name?

[TooManySurnames]

Ok, before I start, last time I did a thread it got picked up by journos so, just in case: please fuck off lazy journo twats.

Right. I have a single 2 syllable surname, lets say "Austen". My partner has a 3-2 syllable double barrelled name, with the first part being relevant to his heritage, say "González-Peters". We both want to share our surnames with our child, and neither of us are willing to change or drop our names, so we're in a stand off. I think he should give the first part of his name as a middle name, and double barrel the rest with mine:

[John] [González] [Peters-Austen]

He think's we should use both names as surnames, but without hyphenating:

[John] [González-Peters Austen]/ [Austen González-Peters]

I think 3 names is too much to saddle a child with, especially when part of it is already hard to spell/ pronounce. He says that it's not 3 names, it's 2, i.e. his name is not "González"+"Peters", its "González-Peters". If we were Peters-Austen then our child would have his fathers name and my name, but not his name. I can see his logic but I still think it's too much, you can't just keep adding names forever!

I'm putting it to the MN jury, and also open to alternative solutions. Will probably show him this thread.

Think of all of those forms, OP. The name won't even fit in the spaces.

I read the OP then cut straight to the end for a little story:

20 years ago I worked in a health care facility (not UK). A family came in, mum and four children aged from around 1 to 7 or 8. They were all feral free-spirited 😊. They all needed some sort of health test to get a foreign visa/residency permit to join dad.

It was an absolute circus, as the mum couldn't recall her DCs precise birthdays, 8 year old was correcting her; but worse, she couldn't get their names right. Which were critical for her documents.

She had:
River Mckenzie-Simon
Ocean McKenzie Simon (no hyphen, K not k)
Leaf Simon Owen
Brooke Simon Mckenzie-Owen

-or similar.

I can imagine they thought it was the coolest thing ever as they named each child!

www.w3.org/International/questions/qa-personal-names

How much does your DH know about his heritage? Possibly not a lot!

It seems that it would not be usual to pass down the in-tact double barrel name from the father (either on its own or as a quadrupole name).

According to the link Spanish speakers would recombine names from each side to make a new double barrel name, while Portuguese speakers in Brazil might occasionally have up to 4 surnames but there's no set rule and they could reflect a variety of ancestors, not the entire name of the father plus the mother.

OP, Would he be up for having his whole surname as a middle name? And yours as the surname? That seems the least cumbersome way of getting the whole lot in.

Also- is it worth having a chat with his Mum? She presumably had a lot of thoughts on this topic some 30 odd years ago...

Hey, sorry I didn't see that there were more replies. This thread was super helpful and I'm happy to say we've decided to go with the Gonzalez-Austen pairing. Sadly the Peters part doesn't really work as a middle name so I think we're just going to leave it out. He hasn't talked to his parents but it doesn't sound like they've followed Portuguese custom themselves as I think his mum was just given one surname when she was born. We will talk to them though as I want them to understand and not feel hurt, but from my experiences with them I'd be surprised if they did. They'e been very supportive of all our other choices to this point. My partner does feel sad about losing a part of his name though, and I understand why, so I can't say it's a completely happy resolution. I don't think there was any "perfect" solution tbh. I guess that's the flip side of joining names though, you just defer the responsibility of dropping one onto your children.

Also Miljah I can totally believe that story, have seen similar myself back when I worked in healthcare!

As someone with a very long name (eight letter first name and 15 letter double barrelled surname) please do not give your child a ridiculous triple barrelled surname.

I love my name but it’s a pita as it never fits in forms and I’m constantly misplaced in records as the never know I’d I’m under the 1st or 2nd part (it should always be the first but frequently isn’t).

Why not give your child your surname as his first name and his surname as a surname?

I'm glad your DH has seen sense.

I have two surnames (no hyphen) and wanted to respond to this:
"That works well back in the place where having 2 surnames not connected by a dash is usual. Try it here and nothing works unless you want to put the dash between the surnames which will result into a single surname."
It's not true that "nothing works". It can be a bit of a faff, but I can still function in society The lack of hyphen allows a bit more flexibility for dropping a surname. This is particularly true in France, for example. If you have a hyphenated surname you have to pass it on in its entirety to your child(ren), but with no hyphen you can pass on just one. (Obviously this is not relevant if your child is not going to live in France or have children with a French person!)

That's great OP!
Have you agreed on the first name... (that's the part which finishes us off!)

It's typical of male entitlement and privilege for a man to expect to give two surnames to his child while his partner is supposed to sacrifice her own surname completely or relegate it to middle name status. I would go so far as to say that a man who insists on giving his child a total of three surnames because he's so precious that he can't possibly drop one surname is actually selfish and is prioritising his own feelings over those of his child. (Luckily OP's partner has relented on this but I see that there is a PP who is still having this debate with her partner.) Perhaps these poor men who are mourning the loss of just one of their two surnames - half their surname - could spare a thought for the women who have been expected to give up their surname(s) - The whole surname - for centuries, and still are. These women are expected to accept not sharing a surname with their children - the children they have borne, birthed and raised - unless they have renounced their own surname(s) after marriage.

I'm not Spanish but I'm a big fan of the Spanish naming system. No one changes their surname after marriage or divorce, children get one surname from each parent, and everyone has two surnames so it's not judged to be posh, pretentious or a bureaucratic nightmare. The only flaw is that it's still weighted in favour of men - the grandfathers' surnames are passed on - but this could easily be fixed, for example by giving the maternal grandmother's surname along with the paternal grandfather's surname (so women's names are passed down the female line and men's names are passed down the male line).

Alternatively, you just choose the two surnames that work best together, or the names that are easiest to spell/pronounce, or (if possible) you merge two surnames into one name so elements from each can be passed on. With a bit of open-mindedness and flexibility, there are a lot of options.

OP, one final thought - if your MIL's surname doesn't work as middle name, maybe you could honour her by using her first or middle name? (If you're having a boy there might be male versions of her names that could work?)

Perhaps these poor men who are mourning the loss of just one of their two surnames - half their surname - could spare a thought for the women who have been expected to give up their surname(s) - The whole surname - for centuries, and still are. These women are expected to accept not sharing a surname with their children - the children they have borne, birthed and raised - unless they have renounced their own surname(s) after marriage.

I strongly agree, and did point out that I didn't just magically come with one surname instead of two like him. The only reason I have only one surname to contribute here is that my mother's name had already been discarded before I was even born. For years and years I felt like my name wasn't really my own because it was "just my fathers" and couldn't see any problem changing my name on marriage because it was just swapping one patronymic for another. But over the last few years, largely due to the brilliant debates I've read on MN, I don't feel that way any more. My name is my own, not borrowed from my father, not disposable, and not defined by my relationships with men. It's so important to me that our children grow up understanding that a woman's identity is just as worthy of being retained after marriage, and passed on to descendants, as a man's.

No one changes their surname after marriage or divorce, children get one surname from each parent, and everyone has two surnames so it's not judged to be posh, pretentious or a bureaucratic nightmare. The only flaw is that it's still weighted in favour of men - the grandfathers' surnames are passed on - but this could easily be fixed, for example by giving the maternal grandmother's surname along with the paternal grandfather's surname (so women's names are passed down the female line and men's names are passed down the male line).

Yup, this would be the system in my ideal world also.

if your MIL's surname doesn't work as middle name, maybe you could honour her by using her first or middle name?

It's actually my MIL's surname that will be passed on, my partner is dropping his father's name from the mix. Partly because he wants to keep the cultural link, and partly because he thought it'd be nice to use the name given after his mother since I am using the name given after my father. We're toying with the idea of using his father's name as a middle name but not sure if it'll work.

"It's so important to me that our children grow up understanding that a woman's identity is just as worthy of being retained after marriage, and passed on to descendants, as a man's."
Hear hear! Totally agree with you on that.

Sorry I got mixed up about the surnames you are using. If he is passing on MIL's surname that's even better! I hope you can find a middle name that will honour FIL in some way.