Names which work in French and English

[Lexylizard]

We have a list of names which might work in French and English (oh Is French), albeit not many boys names. Which do you like, or have you any to add?

Mathilde (Tilly)
Maeva (Maeve)
Emeline
Florence
Elodie (Edie)
Cecile

Hugo
Miles

Theo
Genevieve

Camille, Cami for short

Adele

Tomas

Margot

Margot
Louise
Laura
Isabelle
Anna

Louis
Sebastian
Victor
Luke
Julian
Daniel

Love Maeve and Florence, love nn Florie. I like both Hugo and Miles too. Just some other ideas above!

Nicholas
Isabelle
Charlotte
Elise

Many French people can’t pronounce Th so Theo would be Teo.

Celeste
Amelie
Emily
Esme

Christopher
Alex/ ander
Max

The Anglo French children (from about 5-25)i know are

Stella
Gabriella
Ella
Sylvie
Isabelle
Arabella
Anna
Alice
Sara

Milo
Charlie
Alistair
Patrick
Fred
Thomas
Jaques
Robert
And bizarrely 2 x Matthew, but they wouldn’t recommend it if you live in France (one does, one doesn’t

Also, Ben and Amelie

Aurelie
Celeste

Cosette, Josette, Celeste

Actually this is a very opportune thread!! I am English, DH is French and we live in France. We are having a little girl and the aim was to find a name that works in both French and English. However I seem to have fallen for the name Manon which I think is beautiful in French. However I'm not really sure how it would work in English and am a bit worried she'd be called Man-on. Which is not that lovely!!

What do you think? We have no plans to move back to the UK so she would be essentially a French child with UK family who would know how to pronounce her name. I really love the name but don't want to saddle her with something that really doesn't work in other languages.

Marianne is a nice french name that works in english as well

If you like Hugo what about (la chanson de ...).
Roland

Victor (Hugo...)

Since your first choices are fairly traditional, this should not be too tricky. Most traditional names have a French equivalent. Maybe avoid Irish/Scottish/Welsh names since they will not be as easy to pronounce in French. Some Canadian friends were named Sean/Shawn and found that Québécois friends struggled to pronounce that accurately. Also, anything that starts with H in English will not in French. So Harry/Henry are 'Arrie and Ennree (Henri) They don't really have a W sound either so William becomes Guillaume (Gee yome) and Will is weel

Does it have to sound exactly the same? What if it was Andrew in English but André in French? or Oliver vs. Olivier? Charles vs. Charles (silent S and reduced R to give Shahll or Shahlee = Charlie)

Because Hugo will not sound the same - it will be 'Ugo'. Even if a name looks exactly the same like Ben, there will be slight pronunciation differences.

I'm not pushing the Christian angle here but most Biblical names have equivalents or are nearly the same in all the western languages.
Matthieu
Marc
Luc
Jean (John)

Other French friends of mine:
Eric (ayreek)
Martin
Thomas (hard T 'toma')
Dominic
Paul

Suzanne
Elizabeth (Elisabeth)

Julie(tte) - not Biblical obvs
Lucie
Rose (means the flower and the colour pink)

Maybe try to find a French book of baby names and see how many are similar or if any take your fancy. Surely your OH can advise about what his relatives can pronounce easily and also what might be offensive.

Félicitations!

@kersh33
I knew some people in England with a Manon - apparently it is a Welsh name too so it was not a problem.

Beatrice
Colette
Sophie
Juliette
Noelle
Lucie
Mia
Chloe
Leonie
Gabrielle
Alice
Eloise
Madeline
Vivienne

Leo
Oscar
Liam
Luca
Ruben

Imogen
Stefan

@kersh33 manon is lovely. There was someone with that name on great British bake off.

We are living in England, so the name will be pronounced in an English way more than anything...
Also, my partner's surname is Simonini as he's half French/Italian, so we're finding names that end in a S sound, like Florence and Miles are harder to say in full!

Frederic (Freddie)
Quentin
Enzo

Are other options?

I have an Isabella and it works in every language (apart from in the country she was born ironically so she's called Isambella on her bc) 😆

Really like Fleur

I know two women who are french/English, named Charlotte and Elodie.

Claire

Mathilde (Tilly) - I would use Matilda
Maeva (Maeve) - does it work in any language?
Emeline - Emmeline, not keen
Florence - ok
Elodie (Edie) - nicer in French than English. Not keen on it or Edie
Cecile - not my taste

Hugo - Sounds different in each language
Miles - won't work in French

There are plenty of names that will work, but I'd choose names that sound the same in both languages e.g. Isabelle or Louise, or named that are French or English that won't get altered e.g. Etienne or Pierre. Also check if the name is dated or not, and that it goes with the surname.

Husband is French and his dog was called Enzo, not sure how common that is but when you put in google French name Enzo it comes up with more dogs than men.