so Gordon Browns first name is James - why do peopel not use first names/

[FluffyMummy123]

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From Clairejo's DP>
Long post, stay with me if you can, first a small insight into where this may have come from then my personal experiences.

In ancient Roman society, members of the nobilitas and usually males in particular were usually called by their first name through childhood (Which was often a regularly used family name) but upon reaching manhood would adopt their middle name which was a family name ie Gaius Julius Caesar.

Also to confuse the matter, often two brothers would be called the same name ie Gaius Caesar, but their middlenames would seperate them thus they would be known as their middle name. ie Marius and Julius. Marius would then create his own subfamily using the name Marius. The idea being that you could look down a line of first born male children with the same name in the records, easily located. The romans were fanatical record keepers throughout the late republic and the empire and in order to be traced though ones family line was important.

Looking at the infamous Gaius Julius Caesar, he was named after his father. Gaius Julius Caesar (the elder) who had a brother called Sextus Julius Caesar and a sister called Julia Caeasris. Gaius Julius Caesar's father also shared the name as did his father. One could come to the reasonable conclusion that the name Gaius Julius Caesar gos back a very long way before the infamous conqueror of the late republic. Caesar himself had a daughter called Julia, and adopted his grand nephew as his son in his will who took Gaius Julius Caesar as his name. The name seems to die there as GJ Caesar never had a legitimate male heir. The name Caesar lived on and became a name for all emperors of the roman empire and the name evolved into the word for king in several european coutries (Tzar in Russia and Kaiser in Germany)

So without dismissing it as silly, using a middle name as a calling name can mean a lot to a family where a first name is important. In my family the first name Christopher is used for the first born son, my eldest brother, Father and Grandfather have this as their first name and use/d their middle names for calling. My other brother and I use our middle names too.

I am the youngest of three boys and when my first son was born I wanted to start my own line but figured it wouldn't make much sense as it would have to be the third son of the third son to ramain true to the pattern, so instead I gave my first son the choice to start his own by naming him after his paternal Grandpa and turning John into Jonathan and he gets called his middle name which is my first name -Martyn. By the time my middle son was born my eldest brother had had two daughters and had no plans for any more so it looked like the name Christopher would end in a line here so I decided to use that as my second sons first name and we call him Matthew, which bears no family history other than we found out my cousin used this name for his son but we didn't know on each others part. For my third son we decided that two non family names would be appropriate and would open up a larger pool of names should the following generations wish to name after people in the family. I sonetimes get riddiculed for keeping to the family tradition and both of my brothers have stated at that should they have sons they doubt they will continue it but I thought it was something important to me to do. Yes it can be confusing and a pain sometimes, but it is probably directly responsible for giving me a great confidence to speak to people from correcting people on school register time to visits to the doctor. Some times I let it go, for instance when boarding aeroplanes I am unlikely to meet the person again so I let them call me Martyn, but in other situations it is a great ice breaker and a good topic of conversation. I have fond memories as a child having it all explained to me time and time again and instilled a great respect for my family history and a great respect for other peoples differences in general.

Thanks for taking the time to read and I hope it has opened the topic up for debate. The roman history is not 100% fact as I can't find sources for it other than Wikipedia which is even more contradictory than this post and is based upon my understanding from enjoyment of studying this culture.

My sister doesn't use her first name (Georgeta). It used to be the case in Romania that first names were serious/saints and middle names a bit more frivolous. (My parents ran out of ideas with me, I have only one name.)

It's quite common. I have a couple of cousins and an uncle, all English, who use their second names not their first - various reasons.

I don't use my first name because I don't really like it. It is a very common tradition first name and when I was a kid there was always at least one more in the class. When I was a teenager in my group of about 20 friends, there were 3 of us, and we always seemed to go sit on the same sofa at a party. Someone would call our name and the whole sofa would turn around. After a whlie, no one turned around.

So, when I left the state to go go to Uni, I declared I was changing my name to a nickname of my middle name. People said "You can't just change your name?" and I said "Watch me." And here I am 17 years later still using the new name.

My grandma and my uncle both use their middle names, rather than their first names. Think my great grandad did to. I think it was because of family names and avoiding everyone being called the same thing. Or possible the two names they chose only sounded right in a certain order?

DH's grndad has two names (John James), but choses to use a different name altogether (Jack).

What's wrong with double-barrelled forenames? They're common in many Latin American and European cultures.

My dad's got one.

My first love was a character from a Mexican soap opera called Luis-Alfredo.

Swoon!

There are 3 people in my family who are known by their middle names.

I find it a bit

My df is called James X. I never understood why he refers to himself as X and so does everyone else in his family. Weird. And we're not Scottish but Manx.

I like the name James better than the name df uses.

expat - double-barrelled first names are just more common in some cultures than others, don't you think? All those Marie-Pierres, Marc-Andrés and François-Xaviers are OK in France (or parts of it) but would be a bit OTT in England.

They sound so lovely in other languages, too, Anna .

My dad is Carlos-Adrian. Sounds gorgeous in Spanish.

But 'Charles-Adrian' doesn't sound as nice.

Hulababy, Jack is a nickname for John. Just like John F. Kennedy was commonly called Jack. Today, Jack is often given as a name in itself. But, really, the name is John, and that would explain why your DH's granddad John is called Jack.

Who was it posted that all Scots men are called James? My younger brother (affectionately known as Numpty) is called James - he gets Jimmy.

I had two grannys called Margaret, one got Peggy, the other Meg. My oldest Aunt is called Margaret, but gets her middle name instead, my mum is called Margaret, and gets Mags. My middle name is Margaret, but thankfully I get called by my first name.

I knwo a Nicola Caroline, who gets Caroline and her brother Ian Andrew, who gets Andrew. The reason, according to their parents, who are called Nicola and Ian is to prevent confusion - so why not call them Caroline Nicola and Andrew Ian instead?

I think in France it's to do with having a limited pool of names. IIRC until very recently you were only allowed to use saints' names. So double barrelling gives you more options.

Am sure a French MNer will come on to dispute this, though!

The Welsh did it a bit differently, using the father's name as a surname. So Dafydd ap Ifan's father was Ifan. And Dafydd's son would be, eg. Huw ap Dafydd. Hence all those Welsh surnames which are first names too - Davies, Evans, Hughes, Llewellyn, Owen. There are a few Welsh boys called Owen Owens, Evan Evans, David Davies!

edam - you are right historically, but it changed a while ago. If you look at the statistics for first names in France, anything goes.

My mother has been called by her middle name all her life. Has never caused her too many problems until one day she asked her mother to pay a cheque into the bank for her. My grandmother went to the bank and said she had a cheque for my mother calling her by her middle name. Bank said they had no customer of that name - grandmother insisted that they had and had had one for many years. Bank asked if she was sure she had the name quite right, grandmother said with great indignation "do you think that I don't know know the name of my own child". Bank manager with bearly concealed laughter said that he wasn't suggesting that but she didn't have the right name. Much huffing and puffing followed culiminating in a very sheepish grandmother saying "oh yes, I forgot, her name is...". She wouldn't go in the bank for months afterwards!

Oh saltire my MIL is a Mags - you are not my SIL, are you? No actually Margaret is her middle name too. Never discovered why she is known by it.

But presumably given the French were restricted to a set number of names, then culturally the double barelled first name will stick around for some time?

I know there are lots of Kevins now, what other non-saint names have the French adopted, then? Any - Leaves or Daisy-belles etc. etc.?

I have a couple of adult friends wth double barrel first names. One of those doesn't mind her name shoertning. The other only ever uses the full two names. Friend recently also gave her newborn a double barrel first name.

Take a look at www.meilleursprenoms.com

But the theory saying it is all because of the Romans is flawed - because it was very common practise in Ireland until recently and the Romans never got as far as Ireland

Not just a scottish/irish thing... my Italian mil uses her second name, her first name is Marie (Italian/Frenchified version of Mary) and all girls in her region of Italy (the alps, near swiss border) are called Marie first and then whatever they will be referred to second. I guess that's a catholic thing. Never quite understood it though, why not just use Marie as a second name? In the Argentine side of my family it's tradition to name the first male child after the father, we've got hundreds of Marcelos and Jose Leons in the family, have to make up nicknames to get round that one (another Argentine tradition, NO ONE is called their real name, but a nickname, bit like Brazillian footballers)

Great link Anna, was able to look up the name of a little girl dts befriended last year on holiday. Naïs (pronounced Nayees) is a version of Grace. Very nice!

Link saved to favourites incase I ever need another baby name! Or two so we can continue this calling them one thing and putting another on their birth certificate.

dh is known by his 2nd name - he has been since he was about 2 weeks old. Cant understand why fil & mil didnt give him that name in the first place - especially is first name is quite normal & his 2nd name is horrid. His dad is also known by his middle name when again his first name is better than his middle name. When we had kids I asked dh if we should call them nice first names & crap 2nd names & then call them by their 2nd names. He said he didnt know what I was talking about.

"But the theory saying it is all because of the Romans is flawed - because it was very common practise in Ireland until recently and the Romans never got as far as Ireland"

And of course there are no 'Roman Catholics' in Ireland

Quite common in Wales too.

Maybe it's just England where it's unusual.