spqr
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Post by spqr on Jul 18, 2024 14:56:19 GMT
There's a Heike sitting next to me right now! I would guess over 50, but then you are in Switzerland, and the fact she's not called Vreni or Regula is enough of a shock! Verena seems to be another female name that is largely restricted to Switzerland. Edit: In fact, is that what "Vreni" is an abbreviation of? |
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Post by Devil Wincarnate on Jul 18, 2024 14:59:07 GMT
I would guess over 50, but then you are in Switzerland, and the fact she's not called Vreni or Regula is enough of a shock! Verena seems to be another female name that is largely restricted to Switzerland. Edit: In fact, is that what "Vreni" is an abbreviation of? It is indeed. It comes up in Austria and the Südtirol as well. Less common up in the Big Canton. |
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Post by carlton43 on Jul 18, 2024 15:02:12 GMT
For me the name Heidi is Foreign, Sentimental, Chav and Twee. Names don't get much worse than that, except of course Stephanie which is the pits of all possible names! I'm intrigued to know what your objection is to Stephanie - a pretty standard name isn't it? Very complex and deep-seated and also associated with euphony and my attachment to some names and dislike of others. |
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Post by batman on Jul 18, 2024 15:10:14 GMT
I would guess over 50, but then you are in Switzerland, and the fact she's not called Vreni or Regula is enough of a shock! Verena seems to be another female name that is largely restricted to Switzerland. Edit: In fact, is that what "Vreni" is an abbreviation of? I used to know a young lady called Verena, but she was (no doubt still is) German. |
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spqr
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Post by spqr on Jul 18, 2024 15:35:53 GMT
Verena seems to be another female name that is largely restricted to Switzerland. Edit: In fact, is that what "Vreni" is an abbreviation of? I used to know a young lady called Verena, but she was (no doubt still is) German. On investigating further, it seems that St Verena lived in a hermitage in Solothurn around c. AD 300, and her cult grew in Bad Zurzach in the centuries after her death. So the name is especially associated with Switzerland, but (as you discovered) can be found elsewhere in the German-speaking world. |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jul 18, 2024 16:03:23 GMT
On a similar theme, apparently the name Meritxell is a very common one in the Catalan world, after Our Lady of Meritxell, the patron saint of Andorra. The story is that a group of farmers came across a statue of the Virgin Mary under a flower near the village of Meritxell, and moved it to safety only to find it back in the same place the following morning. After the third day they built a chapel and a shrine for the statue on the site
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Foggy
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Post by Foggy on Jul 18, 2024 16:38:24 GMT
At 41, the former Sugababe Heidi falls within that Range. Her strong Scouse accent (at least to my ears) wouldn't mark her out as posh, mind - though I expect she is by Liverpool standards. For me the name Heidi is Foreign, Sentimental, Chav and Twee. Names don't get much worse than that, except of course Stephanie which is the pits of all possible names! One former Lady Foggy was a Stefanie, so heaven knows what you'd make of that! I do think sentimental and twee names don't take into account that a baby should be expected to grow up into an adult human with actual dignity, but I've never thought of Heidi in that way. It has come to be seen as a bit chavvy though, as others have said. Naming children after alcoholic beverages is indeed extremely downmarket, but not so with cars: Mercedes-Benz was named after a girl rather than the other way around, while Porsche could simply just be heard aloud as a variant on Portia. I had a neighbour who was a German Verena but I don't know if she abbreviated her name at all. I now know a Bavarian Veronica who gladly also goes by "Vroni" so that's similar to "Vreni" I suppose. |
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aargauer
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Post by aargauer on Jul 18, 2024 17:13:40 GMT
Speaking of slightly unusual names, my daughter invariable goes by Frank at home (Franziska outside the house, Francesca in the UK).
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Post by Deleted on Jul 18, 2024 17:16:15 GMT
On the topic of off-beat names, my Muslim wife and I are thinking of Pakistani names for the children - Saad if the first child is a boy, and Noor if the first child is a girl.
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Foggy
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Post by Foggy on Jul 19, 2024 7:42:27 GMT
Speaking of slightly unusual names, my daughter invariable goes by Frank at home (Franziska outside the house, Francesca in the UK). My grandmother sometimes went by Fred, as in Winifred. |
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aargauer
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Post by aargauer on Jul 19, 2024 7:51:55 GMT
On the topic of off-beat names, my Muslim wife and I are thinking of Pakistani names for the children - Saad if the first child is a boy, and Noor if the first child is a girl. We have both a western and an Asian name, which works well. Helps them not get treated like a foreigner in either culture. |
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Post by Devil Wincarnate on Jul 19, 2024 10:03:25 GMT
For me the name Heidi is Foreign, Sentimental, Chav and Twee. Names don't get much worse than that, except of course Stephanie which is the pits of all possible names! I had a neighbour who was a German Verena but I don't know if she abbreviated her name at all. I now know a Bavarian Veronica who gladly also goes by "Vroni" so that's similar to "Vreni" I suppose. The Germanic world seems to love giving women names with three syllables or more, but abhors actually calling them anything longer than two syllables. Especially south of the Main. Hence an army of Vreni, Vroni, Heidi, Marlies, Liesl, Steffi, Franzi... North of the Main, every woman seems to end up being called Tina. |
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Post by batman on Jul 19, 2024 11:00:27 GMT
Marlene is 3 syllables in German, but even that started out as an abbreviation of Maria Magdalene
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The Bishop
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Post by The Bishop on Jul 19, 2024 11:03:30 GMT
And I associate the name Emma with girls my own age, not a woman who would be sixty this year (although in the Germanic world, Emma and Katie are names for old women). Emma had a surge in popularity due to Diana Rigg's character in The Avengers - the oldest of those babies will be approaching 60 now. Though it was far from unknown as a name even before then - eg the former MP Emma Dent Coad (who is now pushing 70) |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jul 19, 2024 11:33:58 GMT
My grandma was Patricia but went by the unisex Pat, now Patricia's an unusual name in this day and age. She was born in the British Raj in 1935 (father Wiilfred Bramhall in the army out there). Of course, if you go back far enough her maternal side were all Irish born but moved here during the famine as I understand it. Mary McAneny was her mother and my dad's grandmother. My cousin is called Patrin which I think is also Irish and I've never met anyone else with that name anywhere.
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Post by Devil Wincarnate on Jul 19, 2024 11:58:14 GMT
Marlene is 3 syllables in German, but even that started out as an abbreviation of Maria Magdalene And even then, women with that name tend to get Lene or Leni. |
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Post by batman on Jul 19, 2024 12:11:42 GMT
Lene made me think of Lene Lovich, whose real name is Lili-Marlene, but Leni made me think of Leni Riefenstahl, whose real name was Helene.
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Post by iainbhx on Jul 19, 2024 12:15:25 GMT
I had a neighbour who was a German Verena but I don't know if she abbreviated her name at all. I now know a Bavarian Veronica who gladly also goes by "Vroni" so that's similar to "Vreni" I suppose. The Germanic world seems to love giving women names with three syllables or more, but abhors actually calling them anything longer than two syllables. Especially south of the Main. Hence an army of Vreni, Vroni, Heidi, Marlies, Liesl, Steffi, Franzi... North of the Main, every woman seems to end up being called Tina. Cindy aus Marzahn erasure! |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jul 19, 2024 12:23:46 GMT
My grandad was Basil which is another name you don't see much now - apart from Basil Brush.
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Post by batman on Jul 19, 2024 12:27:39 GMT
We knocked up a voter called Basil in the Marine ward by-election in Worthing a couple of years ago, who said he was voting Labour for the first time. He was 94 years old.
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