New Banner & Middle Names

Hurrah. Yes, I have a new banner. Am at university at the moment, so my output will be rather slow (hence no posts since Jan 1). So much snow here. 

I'm still poking around with the Telegraph/Times names lists, but here is the top 10 girls middle names (any position) for Telegraph:

1	Rose	101
2	Elizabeth	69
3	Grace	62
4	Mary	48
5	Jane	37
6	Alice	32
7	Charlotte	26
8	Louise	26
9	May	25
10	Ann	22

I'm surprised that Ann isn't higher (though Anne is #14, two spellings may have dented Ann's popularity a little) - it feels much more like a middle name to me than Charlotte. Still, this list proves that Rose reigns surpreme.

Times girls:

1	Rose	64
2	Elizabeth	41
3	Grace	33
4	Mary	33
5	Alice	23
6	Jane	18
7	Anne	17
8	May	17
9	Charlotte	16
10	Florence	13

Sorry for the strange spacing. Once again, Rose is #1. Alice & Jane have swapped places, while Anne is up in #7 (Ann is #12). Louise has dropped all the way down to #15, and so Florence (#12 Telegraph) is up to #10. There are fewer births in the Times list, so that accounts for the fewer middle names.

Number of middle names - Telegraph girls:

No. Of mns.		%
4 mns	10	0.85
3 mns	333	28.34
2 mns	736	62.64
1 mn	96	8.17

2 mns are the most popular, but more than a quarter of Telegraph parents chose 3 mns.

Telegraph boys:

		%
4 mns	16	1.256874
3 mns	540	42.41948
2 mns	624	49.01807
1 mn	93	7.305577
	1273

 Two middles is also still the top for the boys, but the margin between 2 and 3 is not so large, as well as there being a larger % with 4 middle names. 

Times and Telegraph Births

The complete list of first names is available here. I'll be adding middle names and other stuff later. 

Top 10 for each category:

Telegraph Boys:

1	William	77
2	Thomas	50
3	James	43
4	Oliver	42
5	Charles	41
6	Henry	41
7	George	37
8	Edward	35
9	Harry	33
10	Alexander	30

Telegraph girls:

1	Emily	30
2	Alice	26
3	Charlotte	26
4	Matilda	26
5	Olivia	25
6	Amelia	22
7	Isabella	21
8	Sophie	19
9	Daisy	18
10	Poppy	18

Times boys:

1	William	39
2	George	30
3	Edward	29
4	Henry	28
5	Alexander	26
6	James	26
7	Oliver	25
8	Charles	23
9	Thomas	23
10	Oscar	21

Times girls:

1	Emily	17
2	Isabella	16
3	Matilda	16
4	Olivia	16
5	Alice	15
6	Elizabeth	15
7	Sophie	15
8	Poppy	14
9	Charlotte	13
10	Imogen	13

UK Popular Names

Or, humph, it seems that the Office of National Statistics are not publishing a top 100 this year. Anyway, the following lists seem to be the best available:

1) Bounty list - the website isn't working at the moment, but a summary can be found on the BBC or the Times. This is a survey of 380 000 babies (I can find that around 650000 babies were born in 05, so this is about 1/2 of babies born). Its top names are Olivia and Jack (as ever). Possibly the best list available if ONS aren't going to publish a top 100.

2) Telegraph list of the around 2500 births announced in the Daily Telegraph. I myself have been making a note of these births (and those in the Times) and will be writing up a proper analysis when I have time. A little different from the Bounty list - William and Emily are the top names, with Matilda as #2 - though it is #47 on the Bounty list. 

3) Scotland list - at least the General Register Office in Scotland aren't cost-cutting. They also release a complete list of all names used. Jack and Sophie at the top.

4) N Ireland list (pdf) - both N Ireland and Scotland's lists tend to be a little different from England and Wales, though Jack reigns supreme in both countries. Jack and Katie at the top in N Ireland. Little surprised to see Oisin as #4 in the Western Board, though it isn't in the top 20. 

A late addition to the list: The Times. A little different to mine - they possibly included middle names, or names that were not published on the website.

The Names We Choose For Ourselves

Or changing names by deed poll. As reported in the Daily Telegraph today: 

Record numbers change names by deed poll

A record 46,000 people changed their names by deed poll this year, including one man now called Happy Adjustable Spanners after losing a drunken bet.

 

By Matthew Moore 

Other eccentric names adopted by Britons this year include Luscious Lemons, General Ninja Ant and Aron Mufasa Columbo Fonzerelli Ball In A Cup Boogie Woogie Brown.

A 61-year-old woman from Exmouth in Devon changed her name to Saxon Knight to mark her retirement. Mrs Knight, formerly Janice Glover, said: "To me retirement is the start of a new life so I decided I would get a new name too. I chose Saxon because I love the UK.

"I have changed it on my driver's licence and passport too. People seem to like it."

The number of people who changed their legal names in 2008 was up 15 per cent on the previous year, due to the increasing number of divorces and a rise in the number of older people applying online.

Mike Barratt, chief executive of the UK Deed Poll Service, said they expect a surge of applications next month as family rows over Christmas cause couples to separate.

"January is hectic because thousands of people have a 'new name for the new year' attitude and also because there are many marital breakdowns over the Christmas period resulting in separated women wanting to revert to their maiden name."

Although most people adopt a new name for marital or relationship reasons, hundreds made the change to bring a bit of cheer to their lives.

There is now also a Mr Tintin Captain Haddock Confused Brewer, a N'Tom TheHayemaker Haywardyouliketocomebacktomine and a McLovin, the latter named after the lead character in the teenage film Superbad.

Mr Brewer, a 25-year-old stockbroker from Leeds who used to go by the name Chris, chose Tintin due to his receding hairline. Captain Haddock is another Tintin reference.

Seasonal Names

This is a short post. If I write this at the start, then it will be and I will not get carried away.

Yes, it is the Christmas season, which brings me onto thinking about seasonal names and whether one should use them - I'm thinking of naming a child born on Christmas day or in the Christmas season a name such as Noel, Holly or Emmanuel etc., or Pascale at Easter and so on. Should it be done? It gives a name significance to their special birth date for sure, but is it too expected..tacky almost - that the parents are only giving the name because of the birth date rather than choosing a name that they love. Naming can be a process fraught with emotion, and perhaps using a seasonal name takes away the difficulty of choosing a 'beloved' name by both parents. 

Should one use a 'seasonal' name if one is not born on that day? It's a double problem, you see - a Noel sounds a little tacky and overly expected on Christmas day, but is misplaced on any other day of the year. One can extend it to names such as Summer and Autumn - season names - that hold the same problem - a Summer born in winter can be a little strange. Alternatively, if one loves a name, then should one be bound by propriety?  Yes, that does lead onto the question of how far one should take someone else's views intoa ccount when choosing a name. I'm not going into depth on this subject, lest to say - they should neither be completely ignored, nor followed to the extent that 0ne forgets one's own loves.

So, seasonal names. If this hasn't become clear from this post, my own view is choose the names that you love, and if you love a name because it fits in with the season and because of the meaning/sound/origin/flow etc., then that's fine, but don't choose a name solely because of its seasonal connections.

 

Merry Christmas!

And the final Victorian Smiths post is coming soon...

New Background and Some Other News

Yes, the background is now vaguely orange themed. I've been fiddling with the text colours as they were very pale at the start. However, getting a blog theme from an outside site means that they end up with the annoying 'get our backgrounds' thing at the top. It's also shifted the links to the bottom.

I have changed the links a little, so I would just like to highlight why I've chosen them here (and they're in alphabetical order to avoid favouritism):

Appellation Mountain: Really interesting blog that explores in quite considerable depth a different name each day. Also has links to a couple of other name blogs, but they are fairly new so will wait to see how they prove themselves.

Baby Name Map: Seriously useful tool this, type in a name and it gives you the popularity all over the world (it's not complete but has all the core places). Very good also for spatial awareness eg seeing where in the US a name is popular.

Baby Name Wizard: Very insightful blog with the Name Voyager (very interesting popularity graph), NameMapper (spatial over time) and Namipedia (encyclopedia of names, possibly the weak spot of this site - it's very new so not tried and tested). Problem? Exceedingly US-centric. 

Baby Names World: The names database on this site was having a complete rehaul when it was bought by Nickelodeon. It used to be very good and becoming better, now it's stuck at very good. Tends to have interesting facts not found elsewhere, and the pronunciation key is useful.

Behind the Name: Generally thought to be the best, most reliable names dictionary site on the net. Not really aimed at parents, which is part of its appeal. On the right hand side of each name entry, there is a little list of useful links for popularity, related names etc. Message boards also populated by more serious 'name nerds'.

CM Yonge's History of Christian Names  ebook 1 and 2: Click on 2 to get two, click on 1 for one. 1 isn't a complete view. CM Yonge is widely credited as one of the first people to seriously tackle names from a more etymological view. Whilst this book is very outdated, and some of her etymologies are plain wrong, it is an interesting look at a Victorian view of Christian names. On the ebook trend, one may also be interested in Sophy Moody's 'What is your Name?' published not long after Yonge. 

England and Wales Statistics: From National Statistics, the official source, the top 100 girls and boys names in England and Wales for the past 5 years.

England and Wales Top 2000: A downloadable file that has (or claims to have) the top 2000 girls and boys names and number of births for 2007. Useful. Wish I had known about it when constructing my top 10 of English-speaking world.

Free BMD: I used this extensively when creating the Victorian Smiths series. Useful for family history and counting names in the Victorian period/

Nameberry: Fairly new name site, by Pamela Redmond Satran and Linda Rosenkrantz - authors of the popular 'Beyond Jennifer and Jason' series and others. I wouldn't go there for etymologies, but some of their views are entertaining and it's always good to have a new, regularly updated name blog to read.

Portuguese Approved Names: A while ago I did a series looking at 5 names, and one of the criteria was 'approved in Portugal' - basically, if the name isn't on this list then you're going to have a hard time trying to persuade the Portuguese authorities to let you name your baby that. Also just an interesting source for Portuguese names.

US Statistics: The SSA (government) site with the top 1000 names for each year, and can find out how a name has risen in popularity over time.

US top 1000 organised by sound: One of the limitations of the SSA site is that it lists each spelling of a name, and doesn't take account of shared sounds. And so Aidan's huge popularity is masked by the fact that there are 10 different spellings. So this is useful. 

Wikipedia's list of most popular given names: One of, if not the best, things about this page is the list of links at the bottom - saves me from placing all the links here. As it's Wikipedia, some of the top 10s may be a little wonky, so going by the official government sites listed then you can be sure to get more accurate stats.

On an aside, a new post on the Victorian Smiths may be coming soon. Have found the top 20 from 1881 census and so will be looking at how that compares with the Victorian Smiths