Anstey

[Olive180]

Has anyone heard of this name before? How do you pronounce it?

No, I haven't come across it before as a baby's name. Is it a surname from your family tree?

I imagine it's pronounced exactly as it is spelled.

It's a small town just outside Leicester. Never heard it for a person.
I'd say Ann-stee, people from there would say Ann-steh. 😉

It's a village north of Leicester, I know it quite well, also Ansty (no 'E') is just outside Coventry. I can't think why you'd want to name a child after these places. It's not really suitable as a personal name.

Annis (for a girl) is quite close in sound and is an actual first name. Older version of Agnes or something I believe, it sounds quite nice and is unusual too.

It's also a small hamlet in Dorset, pronounced with a silent 'T'; Ansy, but more like Nancy with the short 'a'.

It sounds like a peevish name.

Agreed

Anstey of the Peevish Folk

There are two villages in Devon with Anstey in their name. I quite like it, but probably would use it as too close to Antsy, and I bet you'd end up correcting pronunciation and spelling all the time.

There's a famous Irish novel, "The Tailor and Ansty", by Eric Cross, banned when it first appeared in 1942 and considered an Irish classic.

Ansty is an abbreviation for Anastasia.
Pronounced ANN-stee.

Very hard not to read 'Angsty'

East Ansty or West Ansty? Ann-stee. I don't find it rolls off the tongue very easily as a first name.

It's the surname of my fave TT racer, Bruce Anstey. He's from NZ.

Oh, and its pronounced ans-tee. Not ann-stay.

I know it as a surname.

To my taste it doesn’t have a good sound as a first name. Sounds like angsty and antsy.

Thanks everyone, I wouldn't use it but met a mum with a little girl called Anstey the other day. Very unusual and wondered where it was from. I think she was pronouncing it Ann-see.

@NerdyBird @bobbythevet I was also thinking surely it gets confused for these too.

Oh so you just wanted people to judge a small child’s name.

Small village in West Sussex too.

I really struggled to read the name, I'm dyslexic and occasionally words just won't organise themselves in my head. Apparently this is one of them!

I just see 'antsy'.

Leicestershire association for me.

i know an Annesley (Ann-slee)

It is as word used in a film in the context of needing sex

Not at all. It's not a name I've heard of and it interested me, I wondered where it originated from and how it is pronounced. 'An-see' sounds nice, but the spelling (definitely Anstey) might be confusing for others.

In the US they say 'antsy' a lot to mean irritable or grouchy.
But I guess there is a name Groucho, so Anstey probably OK too.

If you are thinking of Groucho Marx, his real name was Julius. I am not sure anyone has been given Groucho as a real name, but then who knows!