I wonder when names went from made up to well known?

[Soubriquet]

I wonder, how did the first person decide to name their child Laura or Benjamin? Obviously then someone heard the name, liked it and named their child it too, but how did they come up with it and not have people snub it.

I mean surely, Laura is the time would have been like Abcde of now?

"When a true genius appears in the world, you may know her by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against her"

-- Parents of Abcde

Benjamin's father Jacob had lots of children. Benjamin was called it because he was to be Jacob's right hand son.

Laura is from the plant laurel, which is a peace symbol.

Both of those names are very old.
More recent examples might be Vanessa and Wendy.
Peter Pan was first published in 1902, Vanessa first appeared in print in 1726.

Any name then..

Isabel or Max for example

Lorna was made up by RD Blackmore for the novel afaik. I was thinking about names today myself, the way some biblical/Greek/Roman names are popular and some are not. Plenty of Philips and not many Solomons iyswim.

Geraldine is quite a recent made up name too, I think.

Plenty of Irish names are descriptive of physical characteristics so I suppose some names started that way and became popular.

Kathryn seems a recently made up version of Katherine?

They're usually descriptions or character traits rather than random made up sounds put together.

That's why most names have meanings.

Someone told me Katniss was made up, don't know if it was but I've never met a Katniss.

I think Katniss is a plant? At least it is in The hunger games trilogy, Katniss and her Sister Primrose were both names after plants.

Yes just googled it and Katniss is a plant. Wonder if it was ever used as a name before, if not it went from new to well known very quickly. I quite like it as a name.

@Grufallosfriends

Kathryn seems a recently made up version of Katherine?

How recent are you thinking? It seems to have been used for one of Henry VIII's wives as an interchangeable spelling of Catherine..

Nevaeh (shudders)