Dream name Magdalene - but living in Cambridge!

[cambridgecoral]

We decided on our name for our new DD - Magdalene.
It's perfect - works well with our surname and the name of DS. I'm totally enamoured with it!

But I suddenly realised today - we live in Cambridge.
One of the most well-known university colleges here is MAGDALENE COLLEGE!

Arghhhhhhhh!
Is this the worst choice of name? Are we going to look a bit ridiculous if we name her Magdalene?
Is there some variation which would be better?
I'm pretty devastated with this realisation, but worried my bias will push me to go ahead, and we'll end up regretting it later.
What do you think?
Arghhh! 😫

I'm a Catholic too and I don't see the problem?

"She will be very grateful to have such a lovely name" was what I was referring to.

My thoughts! Sorry Op but that name has terrible associations. I’d assume the family were very religious.

This is my understanding too.

I wouldn't think of The Magdalene Laundries either

Magdalene is a beautiful name so use it

My first thought was the laundries.

Laundries here as well but not necessarily a reason not to use it.

I don't think you have confirmed your pronunciation, you're not saying it like the college, are you?

No one will even connect it.

A Cambridge college (and an Oxford one) no reason not to use it. The association with the incarceration and slave labour of hundreds of thousands of women, and the theft of their babies, in Magdalene laundries across the UK, Ireland, the US and Australia (yes, named for the widespread perception of Mary Magdalene as a repentant prostitute) would make it a deeply bizarre choice of name for a child. Some of the mass graves just list the women as 'Magdalene'.

It's a bit like calling your child after a labour camp.

It is a heavy name for a child to carry given everything that we know that was done under it.
I would personally choose an adjacent version of it.

Would Madeline be close enough, but without the historical link to the laundries?
As born and bred Cambridge ex resident, no-one will care about the college link.

I really like the name but this is what would put me off it.

When I've met kids called Ciaus. I've wanted to ask if it's pronounced Keys!

The Magdalene laundries was a misogynistic name, given that there is no evidence based in scripture that Mary Magdalene was a ‘fallen woman’.

Magdalene is a pretty name and I know a catholic Magdalena (Italian).

😂

I’d be more concerned about the connection with Mary Magdalene and the Magdalene laundries. I know the biblical character probably wasn’t a prostitute.. but that’s very much the association.

The collage I wouldn’t remotely worry about.

what are the laundries?

I thought this was going to be a thread about magdalene laundries. Not a name that would be used her OP and has awful associations with it. But if you have never come across it, then your daughter is unlikely to as well.

@misszebra where unmarried mothers were sent to have their babies. Most babies were then adopted whether the mother agreed or not.

🙄
Does it matter

It does make me think of the magdalene laundries, something to consider.

I'm of no religion but my first thought was not of the college, but the prostitute to jesus association 😂

Thanks everyone for your comments!
Re: the laundries. Is it really a bad thing regarding the name?
They named them that in reference to their belief about THE mary magdalene. I don't really pay any mind to the stories that religious people tell themselves. I don't really see the name and the laundries as inextricably linked. Just another example of mary's and magdalene's being used in religious settings. Magdalene seems to be widely used in eastern european and latin american places as a name. Is it really so bad? And is it somewhat reclaiming?
It is just a name, that's hardly a homage to the evils of religion at the time? I dunno!
I appreciate that it is a point against.

Are we going we yay or nay then?

Op you haven’t said if you are ok with her being called maud-lin even if that’s not how you expect it to be pronounced

I think some (just to be a dick) will pronounce it maudlin and that's a miserable thing to be described as.

I wouldn't use it - but I'm the mother of a child at the college so I would pronounce it Maud-lin and therefore it would make me think of depression and sadness. As a Catholic, I would also think of the Magdalene laundries connection.

I think Magdalena is nice though!