Cenék, an old name dating back to pagan times, is still in use among modern Czechs. It is a corruption of Castoslav (častovati, to treat, to show hospitality). For no apparent reason Vincent is sometimes taken instead. Hynek is a corruption of the German nickname Heinz (Heinrich), and, through resemblance to the Spanish Hinigo, is often incorrectly translated Ignatius, which exists in Bohemian as Ignát or Ignač. Both Hynek and Ignát sometimes become Enoch in this country.… Small boys christened Václav are frequendy called Wesley until their Catholic parents become aware of the incongruity of putting their offspring under the patronage of a Methodist saint. Occasionally, however, Wesley remains, or is shortened to Wes. Šilvestr (Sylvester) turns also into Wes. Both Míchal (Michael) and Mikuláš become Mike, though Mikuláš is the Czech form of Nicholas, and should therefore be rather Nick, which I have not heard among American Czechs.93
Monsignor Dudek reports some curious efforts to take American given-names into American-Czech. He says:
Džán and Džim have obtained recognition in print as Bohemian versions of John and Jim; there are also the diminutives, Džaník (Johnnie) and Džimik (Jimmie).94 Gladyška is American-Bohemian for Gladys, which, as far as I know, does not exist in Czech proper.
Chauncey, says Monsignor Dudek, is one American given-name from which Czech-American boys are safe, for it suggests the Czech word čunče, a suckling pig. The girls are likewise protected against Mabel, for most Czechs know sufficient German to think of the German word möbel, which means furniture. “But fond Bohemian-American mammas,” he concludes, “have tried everything from Abalina to Zymole on female infants, and Kenneth, Chilson, Luther, Dewey, Woodrow, Calvin, etc., have been bestowed upon the sons of families clinging to surnames like Kubíček, Ševčík, Borecký, Pospíšil, Veverka and Vrba.” Mr. William Absolon sends me some curious examples: Ellsworth Kos, La Verne Joan Vodnaňová, Wayne Stodola, Priscilla Zeman, Marylin Kučera and Virgil For-rest Strachota. “It is,” he says, “beyond the powers of a hostinsky in Nové Město, Praha, to fathom the visitor who signs the hotel register Courtney Roland Cížek, ordering a vepřová, or Leslie Wells Zástěrka, raising a litre of Plzenský.”
The Greek given-names go the same route. They are not changed, says Mr. Sotirios S. Lontos, editor of the Atlantis, the Greek daily of New York, “in a haphazard way, but more or less in accordance with established standards.” He goes on:
[If a Greek’s] first name is Panagiotis he is advised that henceforth he will be called Pete. Demetrios becomes Jim, Basil is changed into Bill, Haralampos into Harry, Stacros into Steve, and Christos into Crist. If his name is Con-stantine he has the choice of either Gus or Charles, and as a rule he gives preference to the first as nearer in sound to his original name. If he is called Athanasios he can select either Athan or Nathan, or Tom for his new name. Demosthenes is usually abbreviated into Demos. That was too plebeian a name, however, for a certain proprietor of an aristocratic candy shop, who very effectively gave his name the noble form of De Moss. Finally, while anybody called Michael may retain this name for American usage, among his countrymen here he will he known as Mackis, which is the Greek version of Mike.95
Similar patterns of change are to be found among the Syrians. Mikha’il becomes Michael or Mitchell, Jurjus becomes George, Dauud becomes David, Butrus becomes Peter, and Hanna becomes John. So far the Christian Syrians. Among the Moslems Mahmoud takes the strange form of Mike, and Habib becomes Harry.96 The Irish in America seldom succumb to that fashion for Gaelic given-names which now prevails in the Irish Free State. An occasional Irish boy is named Padraic (Patrick), Sean (John) or Seumas (James), but when this is done a concession is commonly made to American speech habits by giving Padraic three syllables instead of the proper two, by making Sean Seen instead of Shawn, and by making Seumas Seemas or Sumas instead of Shamus.97 Such forms as Peadar (Peter), Caitlin (Cathleen), Marie (Mary), Sighle (Sheila), Eibhlin (Eileen), Seosmh (Joseph), Liam (William) and Stiobhan (Stephen) are not often encountered. The Chinese seldom change their family-names, but nearly all of them adopt “American” given-names. In the days when Chinese laundrymen were numerous in the big cities the generic name for them was John, but they also called themselves Frank, George, Charlie, Lee (from Li), Tom, Jim and so on, and I once encountered one named Emil. On higher levels more pretentious names are taken. Thus a late Chinese ambassador to the United States, educated in this country, was Dr. Vi-Kyuin Wellington Koo, one of his successors was Dr. Sao-ke Alfred Sze. Most such Chinese use their original Chinese names at home; the “American” given-names are commonly for use abroad only. In a recent issue of the Chinese Christian Student I find the following somewhat bizarre combinations:
Wesley K. C. May Tennyson Chang
Luther Shao Hunter Hwang
Tarkington Tseng Herman Chan-en Liu
Jennings Pinkwei Chu Mabel Ping-Hua Lee
Quentin Pen Fisher Yu
Ivan Wong Moses Swen
The American Indians, as they take on the ways of the white man, commonly abandon their native names, at least outside the tribal circle. In a list of the graduates of the Carlisle Indian School98 I find a Chippewa named Francis Coleman, a. Seneca named Mary J. Greene, a Gros Ventre named Jefferson Smith, and a Sioux named Inez Brown. Sometimes the tribal names are retained as surnames, either translated or not, e.g., Standing Bear, Bighorse, Blackbear, Yellow Robe, Sixkiller, Lone Wolf, White Thunder, Red Kettle, Owl Wahneeta, Wauskakamick, Beaver, Nauwagesic, Tatiyopa, Weshinawatok, Kenjockety, Standingdeer, Yukkanatche, Ironroad and Whitetree, but such forms are greatly outnumbered by commonplace English names, e.g., Jackson, Simpson, Brown, Johnson, Stevens, Jones, Smith and Walker, and by names borrowed from the Spanish, e.g., Martinez, Miguel, Rodriguez and Ruiz, and from various white immigrant languages, e.g., Leider, Geisdorff, Haffner, Snyder, Volz, Petoskey, McDonald, Hogan, Peazzoni, Lundquist and DeGrasse. On the reservations, the tribal names are in wider use, but even there they are often translated. Says Mr. H. L. Davis:
The Indian Bureau for some years made an effort to retain the Indians’ names in their original languages, translations into English only being sanctioned when the native version was too long or too unpronounceable to admit of fast handling. However, almost all Indian names are ungodly long and almost totally unpronounceable, so translation has been pretty generally adopted everywhere. Sometimes the results are upsetting, especially when the Indians aren’t sufficiently saddle-broke to understand what a name that sounds entirely all right in their own lingo may sound like when translated literally. Appellations such as Dirty Face and Big Baby are received with the utmost solemnity by the Cheyennes, the Sioux have Bull Head and Stink Tail, I have heard of a chief on the Northwest Coast who answered with the utmost simplicity and frankness to Unable-to-Fornicate (or words to that effect), and I once knew a Siletz who insisted with firm complacency that his name, no matter what anybody thought about it, was Holy Catfish.
Native names in the native language have generally been retained among the Navajo and to a considerable extent among the White Mountain Apache. It is a kind of half-and-half business, for the Indian Bureau requires the patronymic to apply to all heirs of a man’s body, which by itself upsets the whole Indian name-system wherever it is applied. Indians in a free state don’t use patronymics at all. Among the White Mountain Apache the problem is attacked more sensibly; the Indians are permitted to take what names they please, and for registration purposes are given reference-letters and numbers, like automobiles.
The Paiute Indians of the Great Basin get round the patronymic requirement by keeping their native names only for religious and ceremonial purposes, and adopting for business use the surname of some white family — generally that of some rancher whom the Indian works for or bums from regularly. This will eventually result, of course, in the native names disappearing entirely, as it has done among the Cherokee and such tribes of the Eastern United States, and as doubtless it did among the Negroes of the South in the early stages of s
lave-importation.99
John remains the favorite given-name among native Americans today, as it has been among people of British stock since the Norman Conquest. Following it comes William, and following William come James, Charles and George.100 The popularity of John and William, says a writer in the Nation (New York), “cannot be explained on the grounds that they are short, for William is not, or that they are Biblical, for so are the now happily extinct Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, or that they are fine, strong names, for so are Roger, Guy, Nicholas and Bartholomew, which have hardly any currency.” For a time John’s and William’s popularity was so great that it was necessary to qualify them. In 1545 the will of John Parnell de Gyrton ran thus:
Alice, my wife, and Olde John, my son, to occupy my farm together til Olde John marries; Young John, my son, shall have Brenlay’s land.101
I once knew an American family, of German origin, in which it was an immemorial custom to name every son John. There were eight or ten in that generation: they were distinguished by their middle names, which ranged from Adam to Thomas. After the publication of the Genevan Bible, in 1570, children began to be given Biblical names in England, but the fashion lasted only long enough to be transplanted to the New World, where vestiges of it are still encountered. I find Reuben, Zebulon and Josh (apparently a clipped form of Joshua) on the roll of the Seventy-fourth Congress, and Ezra, Hiram, Ezekiel, Zechariah, Elijah, Isaiah and Elihu in “Who’s Who in America.” These names excite the derision of the English; an American comic character, in an English novel or play, usually bears one — that is, when he is not named Jefferson or Washington. The pious extravagances of the Puritan nomenclature belong to half-forgotten history, but they are recalled by certain surviving women’s names, e.g., Mercy, Faith, Charity, Hope and Prudence, and by occasional men’s names, e.g., Peregrine and Preserved. The more old-fashioned Mormons sometimes name their children after eminent characters in the demonology of their faith, e.g., Nephi, Lehi, Mahonri and Moroni, all of which are to be found in the Salt Lake City telephone directory, along with many Hebers, Jareds and Lamans. But the younger generation leans toward more fanciful names, e.g., La Rue, Yerma, Tola and Lavar for girls, La Mar, Feramorz and Herald for boys, and La Verne for both girls and boys. Among the Youngs of Salt Lake I find two Brighams, a Percival, a Don Carlos, a Spencer, a Seymour and a Leslie, but no Nephi or Moroni.102 Some years ago a devout Norwegian Mormon in Salt Lake City named his twin sons Cherubim and Seraphim. The use of surnames as given-names is far more general in the United States than in England, or, indeed, than in any other country. Fully three out of four eldest sons, in American families of any pretensions, bear their mothers’ surnames either as first names or as middle names. This use of surnames originated in England during the Seventeenth Century, and one of its fruits was the adoption of a number of distinguished names, e.g., Cecil, Howard, Douglas, Percy, Duncan and Stanley, as common given-names.103 But the English began a return to John, Charles and William during the century following, and now the use of surnames is distinctively American. Of the fourteen Presidents of the United States who have had middle names at all, nine have had family names, and of these three dropped their given-names and used these family names instead. Six other Presidents have had family names as given-names. This makes fifteen in all, or half the whole number since Washington. On the roll of the House of Representatives, Seventy-fourth Congress, I find Representatives christened Graham, Prentiss, Bryant, Wilburn, Glover, Parker, Colgate, Braswell, Everett, Usher, Wall, Aubert, Hampton, Allard, Finly, Byron, Dow, Lister, Marvin, Maury, Tilman, Jennings, Comp-ton and Hatton, beside the usual Randolphs, Chesters, Lloyds, Cliffords, Melvins, Schuylers, Wesleys, Miltons, Deweys, Clevelands, Bayards, Warrens, Chaunceys and Elmers. Chauncey was the surname of the second president of Harvard (1654–72). It was bestowed upon their offspring by some of his graduates, and came into immediate popularity, possibly on the ground that it had a vaguely Biblical smack. Elmer was the surname of two brothers of New Jersey who played active but forgotten parts in the Revolution.104 Washington, Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln, Marshall, Columbus, Lee, Calvin, Luther, Wesley and Homer, all familiar given-names in the United States, are quite unknown in England. It is common in this country for a woman, on marrying, to use her maiden surname as a middle name; thus, Miss Mary Jones, on becoming Mrs. Brown, signs herself Mary Jones Brown. It is also common, as I have noted in Section 1 of this chapter, for divorcées to use their maiden surnames in combination with their late husbands’ names, either with or without hyphenization; thus, Mrs. John Brown, née Jones, on leaving John’s bed and board, becomes either Mrs. Jones-Brown or Mrs. Jones Brown.
Many strange given-names are to be found in any American list of names. A former Chicago judge, once constantly in the newspapers, was baptized Kenesaw Mountain, after the scene of General W. T. Sherman’s defeat on June 27, 1864.105 The general himself had Tecumseh for his middle name — one of the very few cases of a white man bearing an Indian name in American history. He was called Cump by Mrs. Sherman. A late politico of New York, once a candidate for Governor, had the given-name of D-Cady, and a late American ethnologist, McGee, always insisted that his first name was simply W J, and that these letters were not initials and should not be followed by periods. A public accountant in Philadelphia is Will-A. Clader: he tells me that “the hyphen is the result of poor chirogra-phy” and that he adopted the style because people began using it in writing to him. In Connecticut, some years ago, there was a politician named K. N. Bill whose given-names were Kansas Nebraska, and he had a sister baptized Missouri Compromise.106 The chaplain of the United States Senate is the Rev. Ze Barney T. Phillips, D.D.: the Public Printer had to have a character specially cut to print the name.107 A well-known American writer, of Spanish ancestry, is Emjo Basshe. His given names were originally Emmanuel Jode Abarbanel. “When I grew older,” he says, “and realized that one could not carry around so many names without tripping I took Em from my first name and Jo from my second, and Em Jo came to life. Foolishly I did not join the two, and a lot of critics had a holiday with them. But I did later, and Emjo became my name, legally and otherwise.”108 There was a Revolutionary patriot named Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer, and he has a descendant of that name in Maryland today. Thornton reprints a paragraph from the Congressional Globe of June 15, 1854, alleging that in 1846, during the row over the Oregon boundary, when “Fifty-four forty or fight” was a political slogan, many “canal-boats, and even some of the babies … were christened 54° 40’.”
In many minor ways there are differences in nomenclatural usage between England and the United States. The English, especially of the upper classes, frequently give a boy three or more given-names, but it is most unusual in the United States. Michael is now fashionable in England, but here it is bestowed only rarely.109 Evelyn, in England, is given to boys as well as girls, but not in this country, though Florence is sometimes encountered among Irishmen, and a late Governor of Kentucky, indubitably he, was the Hon. Ruby Laffoon. Many aristocratic English given-names, e.g., Reginald, Algernon, Percy, Wilfred, Cedric, Cyril, Cecil, Aubrey and Claude, are commonly looked upon as sissified in the United States, and any boy who bears one of them is likely to have to defend it with his fists.110 Only one Percival, so far as I know, has ever appeared in “Who’s Who in America.” It is very uncommon, in England, for diminutives to be bestowed at baptism, but in this country many girls are christened Peggy, Flo, Mamie, Mollie or Beth, and on the roll of the Seventy-fourth Congress I find a Ben, a Phil, a Josh, a Bert, a Dan, a Tom, an Abe, a. Nat, a Sol, a Hattie (once the only lady Senator), a Fritz, two Pats (both in the Senate), two Wills, three Joes, five Sams, five Harrys and seven Freds. The Texas delegation alone, twenty-three head of he-men, shows a Tom, a Sam, a Nat, a Joe and a Fritz. The Newton study of American given-names puts Harry in thirteenth place, with 1112 occurrences in every 100,000 individuals, and Fred in twenty-seventh, with 509. The English Hal is seldom used in this country; here the usual diminut
ives for Henry are Harry, Hank and Hen. Alf is also uncommon in the United States, and Jem is unknown. Ted, in England, is the diminutive for Edward; here it is used for Theodore, especially in the form of Teddy. In the Southern highlands, says Dr. Josiah Combs,111 diminutives are very widely used, and “any highlander is lucky if he escapes with his original first-name.” The same might be said of most parts of the country. Dr. Combs gives some examples: Ad for Adam, Cece for Cecil, Am for Ambrose, Clem for Clement, Hence for Henderson, Jace for Jason, Lom for Columbus, Newt for Newton, Gid for Gideon, Lige for Elijah, Rance for Ransom, Ves for Sylvester, and Zach for Zachariah, and, among girls’ names, Barb for Barbara, Em for Emma, Marg for Margaret, Millie for Millicent, Mildred and Amelia, Phronie for Sophronia, Suke or Sukey for Susan, Tavia for Octavia, Marth for Martha, Tildy for Matilda, and Tish for Letitia. He might have added a great many more, e.g., Lafe for Lafayette, Wash for Washington, Jeff for Jefferson, Frank for Francis, Bill for William, Mollie for Mary, Mamie or Polly for Margaret, Lizzie or Betty for Elizabeth, Gussie for Augusta, and so on. The common mountain name for any boy, he says, is Bud, for any male, Baby, and for any female, Sug.112 A number of given-names are pronounced differently in England and America. Evelyn, in England, is given two syllables instead of three and the first is made to rhyme with leave. Irene is given three syllables, making it Irene-y. Ralph is sometimes pronounced Rafe, and Jerome is accented on the first syllable. Some years ago there was a fashion for changing the spelling of American girls’ names, and the country bloomed with Sharlots, Ysobels, Edythes, Kathryns, Goldyes, Sadyes and Maes, but now only Mae appears to flourish. Despite the frequent bestowal of diminutives at baptism, I believe that their use is also declining. When I was a boy it was very rare, at least in the South, to hear such names as William, Charles, Frederick, Elizabeth, Margaret and Lillian uttered in full, but now it is common. Finally, the American custom of annexing the regal II, III, etc., to the surnames of boys bearing the given names of uncles, grandfathers or other relatives is quite unknown in the Motherland,113 and so it is the custom, now happily passing, of addressing boys named after their fathers as Junior.
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