Antigone?

[Toastwithtea]

For a half Greek, half English baby girl? Living in the UK, outer London, if relevant!

I can beat that @CrystalSingerFan – aged 16 I recited a speech from Antigone (where she says she refuses to obey the city's laws, and instead will follow the moral laws of the gods) in Greek at a classical speaking competition my school sent a team to each year. I reckon that’s middle class to the nth degree.

Fantastic! 😍

You win the internet today. And possibly the 'insufferably middle class' prize. (Unless you iz akshally Greek, obvs.) Or we're heading into 'upper class' territory. Or someone comes on from Oxbridge where they occasionally stage classical drama in Greek/Latin, and they've done the whole damn thing.

C'mon Mumsnetters...

Antigone is pretty but I wouldn’t like to be called it personally - I introduce myself to multiple people per day at work and I could see people round here saying “Anti what?!” and me having to explain my name loads of times a day. But Tiggy sounds a bit informal and like a cat’s name to me for a formal, work situation.

Me too
what a shame absolutely all of those end in some ridiculous ‘ie’ nickname

I thought the same. I knew how to pronounce it, written down it has connotations of anti-septic and anti-bacterial… not the kindest of names to choose.

For me it would be about burdening my child with the vibes of such a name. I am probably a bit superstitious, but just as I wouldn’t call my daughter Ophelia or Desdemona, I wouldn’t go for it because for me it is a name associated with tragedy.

Never heard of it before in my life and i thought it was spoken literally as it’s written and it sounds like the name of some industrial cleaning product.

using it will just burden your child or a life of teasing and being called all sorts by everyone they come across.

I only know how to pronounce it because there was one on love island. I think it's horrible

It reads like a molecule or warning.

To be fair, Hermione and Persephone got very overused 10-15 years ago if MN is anything to go by!

Antigone is the worst, imo, as it's just an ugly name when you view it in the eyes of people who don't know how to pronounce it.

It’s a weighty, meaningful name. I’d go with it! I also like Iphigenia but the association there is also tragic.

If you're looking for Greek names that may be slightly easier for English people to pronounce correctly, then what about these (although you may have thought of them already):

Nikoletta
Valentina
Athina
Evi
Marianna
Eva
Eleni
Anastasia
Chrisoula
Sofia
Orianna
Kontessa
Anthoula

I love this!

Why are people so sure it will be shortened? I went to school with an Antigone, throughout the whole 7 years she was called.... Antigone! No one thought it was weird as kids are v accepting and don't judge names in the same way adults do. The kids in my son's class at school are called all sorts of weird and wonderful names and he couldn't care less. If you like it, go for it OP.

Genuinely had never heard of it before. When I saw the thread title in "baby names" I thought you'd put it in the wrong spot and were asking about a cleaning product.

I agree that once you've heard it, no problems, but I'm imaging her professional life, or literally anywhere it's just written and not said and... it doesn't sound positive. It's literally a 2 not pleasant words together (Anti & Gone). I would want someone to read my kids name and think "how lovely!" not "Wow, Apple, okaaayyy..."

Gonna’ be honest and say I thought it was pronounced ‘anti-gone’ when I read the thread title and didn’t realise it was about a name, never come across this name before. Definitely unique!

Nope, much better classic names out there. People will get confused about the pronunciation and poor child will spend her life correcting them.

I like the name and u oh like Tiggy.I don't think pronunciation is too hard we all know Hermionefor example.

I think there are nicer Greek names for a child who does not live in Greece.

If you plan on moving there, all fine all well as people are going to pronounce it correctly.

Think about how you are going to feel about telling people over and over how to pronounce her name. Just because she will be enrolled at school and they will know how to pronounce it, doesn't mean there everywhere else will.

I speak as someone whose child has an Irish name and a good chunk of his life, his name has been mis-pronounced.

And if you plan on shortening it anyway, is that not defeating the point of using the original name.

And kids can be mean.

Use it!

The English speaking world has got its head round Siobhan, Niamh and Hermione. I'm sure people will cope, and you can educate them otherwise.

Same, although thanks to this I would pronounce it onti-gone. And that just doesn't sound like a nice name in English.

DH has a mate called Antigone and when he pronounces it Antig-onny I always correct him 😆

To me Antigone is slightly too close to Agony (as Violet is to Violent etc)

How about Phaedra? Also had a tragic backstory but so many classical Greek names do.

I think there's much prettier Greek names, I'm not a fan of the look or sound of it.

It makes me think of antagonise.