Name changed for obvious reasons.
My son is 8 and is called Magnus. I am Scottish and my husband is half English half Norwegian, so Magnus has a Norwegian “Bestefar” (Grandpa) who was delighted with our choice of name, especially as DH speaks no Norwegian. FIL says it is very classic in Norway. (FIL has a close friend called Odd-Erik, that was our second choice 😉).
I don’t think of Magnus as a Scottish name really, never knew one growing up, and I’ve never been to Orkney. I was a huge Mastermind fan as a kid though and Magnus Magnusson (of whom more later…) was a very popular figure in Scotland in the eighties. However I do agree that Magnus might seem a bit Scottish to some people, probably because it reminds them of Angus. My neighbour cheerily calls out “Morning Angus!” to my son every time she sees him…
I don’t get the nickname Gus for Magnus though- you can’t just disregard the N! My Magnus gets the odd affectionate “Maggie” from other kids but mostly it’s not shortened. FIL says that something sounding a bit like “Nussah” is a popular diminutive in Norway.
Like a pp, we get very strong positive reactions to the name, and I can tell when people are not simply being polite. We live in London and I find that nobody bats an eyelid at any name around here, but Magnus as a name does fit our family profile very well so perhaps that is part of why people are so positive about it. He is at private school I’m afraid, so I have to fess up to that stereotype. Neither DH nor I come from posh backgrounds though.
Magnus himself seems to like his name, has never been teased and hasn’t yet met another one. He loves sharing a name with Magnus Carlsen as he is big into chess and maths, but there is a strongman Magnus too and he likes that association as well. I don’t worry about him not being great or mighty enough to live up to the name.
I like that the name is pronounced as it is spelled and has two short syllables, because that makes it easy for non-English speakers to say.
Children who know Matilda will associate the name with Miss Honey’s kindly father, Dahl of course being Norwegian.
The PM in Borgen has a son called Magnus and, funnily enough, it sounds more like “Manus” when the Danes say it.
Magnus Magnusson (MM) was not actually born Magnus Magnusson. MM’s Dad was called Sigurstein and Sigurstein’s Dad was called Magnus, so he was Sigurstein Magnusson. Sigurstein gave his son the first name Magnus after his own Dad. So MM was born Magnus Sigursteinsson. However the family moved to Scotland when MM was young (I think Sigurstein was the Icelandic ambassador or something) and the Scots could not get their head around young MM having a different surname to his Dad. So, to make life easier, MM used Sigurstein’s surname and an iconic TV name was born. TL;DR he was technically Magnus Magnusgrandson.