Name: Guinevere? favourite nickname?

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I’m 30 weeks pregnant today with a baby girl yay! It’s my first born and we are trying to think of names. Both our families are welsh but we live in England. I’m also a massive Merlin fan! I love names like Guinevere, Morwenna, Emrys, Ellis.

We both like the name Guinevere (I know not strictly welsh but comes from the welsh Gwenhwyfar) so close enough. I like that it’s unusual (not in the top 100 names which I am keen to avoid + We are both teachers and keen to avoid many of the popular names like Isla, Ava, Sofia etc etc.) I also like that it can be shortened to lots of different things eg:

• Gwen
• Wynne
• Winnie
• Ever
• Neve

(I don’t like Vera as a shortened name of Eva)

Is Guinevere useable? Which is your favourite nickname?

Jennifer is the Welsh version of Guinevere as I understand it so you could also consider that.

Thanks, I didn’t know that! Unfortunately I really don’t like Jennifer!

We have also rejected Gwyneth (because I hate Gwyneth Paltrow) Genevieve (just because I don’t like it!)

Viva?

Gwin is the natural shortening to me

Gwinny

We also really like Gwinnie, forgot to mention that nickname!

I had a friend called Guinevere, it really suited her, she was really lovely, and it got shortened to Guin - NOT Gwin or Gwinny (although Guin and Gwin sound exactly the same!). Lovely name OP.

Gwinny, like the girl in The Ogre Downstairs by Diana Wynne Jones - one of my favourite children's books

Gwen is lovely too.

Did you know that Ginevra is the Italian version of Guinevere? Might be an option.

GiGi, Gwynnie, or Vivi.

Although I do tend to think that nicknames reveal themselves, rather than are chosen.

I think it will be shortened to Guin unless you never call her Guinevere and choose another shortening as a nick name that you always use.

Think about nicknames;
They tend to always be the first syllable of the name, so for example Matt, Jen, Cath, Chris, Dave, Lil, Beth, Liz etc.

If you don't like Guin I wouldn't use Guinevere.

Gwinnie is lovely.

See I love Guinevere but I don’t like Guin. I don’t think that’s a problem. Although I agree some nicknames are from the first syllable of full names..

My name is Charlotte my nickname is Lottie (which is a very popular nickname for Charlotte). I think there are plenty of examples of nicknames where they aren’t the first part of the full name…

eg.

• Charlotte (Lottie)
• Alexandra (Lexie)
• Henrietta (Etta)
• Augustus (Gus)

Guin sounds like a boy's name. I think it's spelt differently, but it still sounds boyish. Which you might not mind, but it could be confusing! Gwen is nice. TBH it's only three syllables, I'm not sure you need to shorten it - although it'll probably get shortened once they start school.

I'm not going to argue with you when you are pregnant and looking for a lovely name for your baby, and Guinevere is very lovely indeed.

However, the very vast majority of name shortenings are the first syllable, people are lazy and will choose the path of least resistance when referring to each other, unless the parents make it extremely clear that another nickname is to be used preferentially and embed that name from very early on so that the child refuses to answer to the easiest shortening.

If you use Guinevere and don't go down this route of embedding a preferred nickname and using it to the exclusion of the full name then people will use Guin.

Even if for example, you call her winnie and hardly ever use Guinevere then she will still probably be referred to as Win by close friends/colleagues etc. Its just how humans behave.

Haha fair enough, just saying as a Lottie, no one has ever once referred to me as “Char”. My sister Alexandra is Lexie.. so I guess you can choose whatever nickname you want and introduce yourself as that!

Thanks I agree Guin does sound quite masculine!

I actually think Lottie and Lexie are lovely for siblings 😊
Your parents obviously thought that one through rather nicely!

My best friend at college was called Morgana, we call her Moggie.
She has a younger sister who is called Guinevere and she’s always been known as Arthur!

Haha thanks! We are both shortened often to Lot and Lex so you are right in that sense people are lazy and do pick the first bit sometimes!

I love morgana, and that’s so funny Guinevere is shortened to Arthur. They must have been major King Arthur story fans too!

It's a nice name - well known but I assume not widely used.

My immediate thought on seeing the thread title before reading any posts was Ginny though Gwinnie is more obvious.

Gwen (but Gwin makes more sense).

The others are too far fetched, in my opinion, especially Neve and Ever.

I’ve only met one person with this name and her family called her Ginny/Jinny.
everyone else used her full name. I think it’s a beautiful choice.

both of my kids have Nick names that in no way relate to their actual names. They’re personality traits or a silly funny thing they said as a child and turned into a nickname

😃 excellent nickname