What makes a name (in your opinion) pretentious and why ?

[Stannie]

Just wondered really..

I think labelling something/someone pretentious is very dependant on where your own background/standing but as we all are only very loosely gathered into social groups/trends it's fairly impossible (IMO) to call a name in particular pretentious.. what might sound so to one person maybe a perfectly normal name to another..

What in your opinion makes a name fall into the dictionary meaning - which is "characterized by assumption of dignity or importance" - and why ?

For example I don't think Persephone (mentioned in another thread) is in any way pretentious but I went to school with a Mungo and I have a very, very unusual name which I love.

Herlinga made me think of cunnilingus

I've put a snap up so you can check suitability

Be kind, it will be gone soon

I think you need to make your profile public SardineQueen

Great names being bandied about on here - Isadora - lovely!

Still can't get head around Herlinga though - PMSL @ Token Female !

Greta and Ingrid are very complementary - lovely names..

I think for me a 'pretentious' name indicates attention seeking. A kind of 'look at special me and my unique and superior children'. This holds whatever the context and whether the resulting name is Princess Tiaawotever, Apple or indeed Persephone and Antigone.

I also dislike names that are over the top posh. There are 'smart but serviceable' names - Harry, Isabel, Oliver whatever, and then there are the Araminta, Annabelle and Tarquin names.

Ottilie is GORGEOUS

We have a Mafalda and soon to have a Floriana. I am Italian though so I think its ok (and not too poncey) but actually I don't care cos I like them!

Thing is it's all relative...it's what we are used to hearing. People name their daughters Helen without expecting them to be the most beautiful woman in the world. I always think it must be awful to be a plain Helen.

my brother is called george and in the 70s 80s it was a really rare name, old man's name etc etc...now its really popular, he was teased like crazy in school though.

Have just come back to this thread and found these two comments very interesting:

"Some people want to fit in with social expectations and please other people with their choices"

"My understanding of a 'try hard name' is one that you think you should use, rather than the one that you really want to"

If there really ARE people who name their children on that basis, then I feel strangely happier with our ("unservicable" "posh", even "gay") names choices, because I have lost all respect for such people's opions! We chose names that we love - simple as that!

Yes, Floriana is indeed very pretty.

I also like Florian for a boy - very popular in Germany - although dh vetoed on the basis of sounding a little 'feminine'.

Yes agree mrswoolf - I would add that category to my attention seekers. Hulabula I too chose my DD names because I loved them and they are those of beloved relatives. And it's my own name that has been described as 'posh but serviceable' (I take strange comfort from the latter)! But the op wanted honest opinions. Believe me if you told me you had named your new born Antigone then I would congratulate you. But if you are asking me the kind of names I consider pretentious....

I love Leonora and Annabella. Also know a Cassiopeia. Quite like Lucius for a boy too.

If anything is too 'out there' a child can also abbreviate it and make it a bit more benign going forward? (Cassiopeia - Cassie etc)?

One of mine had a very unusual name that so many criticised at the time and yet now it see beginning to be mentioned on here with more favourable feedback.

My in laws believed that their children should have names that were not going to stand out at all. Their personal choices almost didn't come into it. Interestingly they have all done very well.

To me their choices were unbelievably dull but can see where they were coming from.

It's quite difficult to know the motivation behind a name isn't it though? We gave our DD an unusual name because it was a family name and we absolutely loved it. We just started using it when she was a bump and it became her name. Some people hearing it would assume we were choosing it to seek attention or because we were making some kind of statement about how wonderful we are - we weren't, it was quite simply the name that fitted our DD. I think most people are going to think a name is pretentious based on their feelings about it, not because of the reasons the parents chose it. We gave her normal middle names to compensate in case she hates it when she's older - there's also one very normal-sounding shortening which is handy. We've had mostly very positive reactions which is lovely It does make naming no.2 a bit tricky though!

I think a name is only pretentious if it is chosen for other people.

If you name a child in order to project the image of yourself that you want others to see.

That name can be Kanye-Diddy or Ottilie-Harriet.

A name should be chosen because the parents like it. In some families certain names are very important and that is fine too.

I dont think there is any difference in the way that working class aspirational and middle class aspirational parents choose names. They do it for the same reasons, its just the names that are different. And of course its terrific fun to take the piss out of Kelly marie and her little Mackenzie-Morgan

just an anecdote on princess tiiaammii or however you spell it. She goes to a children's establishment where my son goes and her namepeg is always placed next to a little boys called William to read "Princess William" which makes me laugh - but bit sad to see a little girl having the p taken out of her, indirectly admittedly, before she is even aware of the fact that her parents are insanepretentious.

Also why bother with the tiiammi bit if she is only ever know as princess (I think I prefer Tiiammi - sounds less like a poodle)

Leonora and Annabella would just make me wonder if the parents were Italian. I wouldn't instantly think pretentious. Although perhaps Lenore and Annabel together might make me think Allen Poe fan??

Annabel seems plainer to me than Isabel, but Isabel is serviceable and Annabel is over the top posh???

Maybe I have to take back some of what I said!! I would never have thought Annabel was over the top posh.

Araminta, Tarquin, Jolyon and Antigone would be 'too far' for me. I guess everybody's line is different.

Tiiammi is just too ridiculous. She is a gorgeous child luckily!

I loved Isadora then my sister reminded me when we were little we liked a book called 'Wizadora' and since then (and her singing the song) I always think Wizadora not Isadora

I have an Ottilie. It's a family name (German). She gets called Ottilie Butterly at school.

at Stannie's Graco buggy....have one too, on visit to HV the other day DP was disgusted that all the knackers there had the same.....Think I would rather die than buy a Bugaboo...kinda reverse snobbery tho!

Just to clarify - I like the name Ottilie. Think its v.pretty.