Naming children in Iceland – and around the world
I’m fascinated by naming practices around the world which differ far more than you might imagine.
So I was interested this week to see a news item about how a girl in Iceland had had to go to court to win the right to use the first name given to her by her mother: Blaer – which means “light breeze”
So many of the implicit assumptions that citizens of the English-speaking nations make about names in other countries are simply wrong:
- It is assumed that the meaning of names is unknown and unimportant – but (virtually) all names have meaning if only we knew it and, in many, many cultures, names are chosen precisely because of their meaning.
- It is assumed that given names are gender-specific – but many African and all Chinese given names can be applied to boys and girls.
- It is assumed that, when someone has more than one given name, the first is the one used in everyday life – but in Germany it is the second or the given name nearest the family name that is the ‘call name’.
- It is assumed that people have a single family name – but, in Spain and Portugal, they have two.
- It is assumed that people take their family name from their father – but girls in Iceland take their family name from their mother.
- It is assumed that family names are not gender-specific – but, in most Slavonic countries, family names ending with ‘-ov’ and ‘-in’ add an ‘a’ in their female form and Polish and Lithuanian have their own endings for female last names.
- It is assumed that given names come first and family names come last – but the reverse is the case in countries like China, Japan, Vietnam and even Hungary.
- It is assumed that all countries have family names as well as first names – but Burma and large parts of India do not have family names.
You will find my comprehensive review of naming practices around the world here.