Real People Named After Fictional Characters

[John (Nevets)]

And seeing your post Erin, made me wonder how many folks are named after geography (my sister is named after Ireland as well). And combining the two has to be even rarer, people named after fictional geography, anyone hear of anyone? I can't think of any off the top of my head. Correction, I just looked back at this post and found Sean knew a few.

[Sky]

Now that my wife is pregnant, i've been stalking What to Expect message boards. There was a hilarious flame war over whether it is OK to name your kid Lucifer, with it being such a beautiful name but having some negative connotations associated with it.

[Tassie Dave, S&L Historian]

Sky wrote: "whether it is OK to name your kid Lucifer, with it being such a beautiful name but having some negative connotations associated with it. "

"Morning Star" is a beautiful name for a child ;-)

Like Adolf was a perfectly fine boys name, up until 1933. Not so much after ;-)

[Gaines]

Our youngest's best friend is named Harrison. He knows every single line from every Star Wars movie ever made, by heart, and is a walking encyclopedia of Star Wars trivia.

[Trike]

Sky wrote: "Now that my wife is pregnant, i've been stalking What to Expect message boards. There was a hilarious flame war over whether it is OK to name your kid Lucifer, with it being such a beautiful name b..."

When I was in Africa I met people who were named after the weirdest things. Because they have no relation to English, they named their kids things that simply sounded good to them. It was the equivalent of white people getting Maori tattoos.

My driver one day told me his name was David, but that was just his "work name" to use with white people. He said his real name was -- I'm attempting to convey the accent here -- Ehbrish. After some back and forth I realized he was saying "Hairbrush." He was the only person in his family who spoke English.

I've heard of African kids named Hitler and Stalin. They have no idea who those guys were, they just like the sound of the name.

I was telling this to the tile guy working on my kitchen today and he told me his neighbors had adopted a Chinese girl they named Onara, which they had overheard someone call their kid in a sushi restaurant and liked the sound of it. I mean, it's bad enough they were mixing up China and Japan, but when they told someone who spoke Japanese their daughter's name, the person looked horrified.

Turns out in Japanese "onara" means "fart."

[Kat]

I have a friend who was adopted from Korea. Her adoptive parents were diplomats in Japan at the time, and her mum wanted to call her Umi, which is Japanese for ocean.

However, giving a Korean girl a Japanese name seemed wrong to her parents, so they looked at traditional Korean names. They found a lot of girl's names ended in -Hee (for example Jae-Hee or Beon-Hee), so they named her Uhm-Hee, and pronounced it Umi.

I thought that was a good solution.

[Pat]

A friend of mine has a daughter called Arwen and another has a son called Logan after Wolverine.

Another friend, Jamie, is named after Jamie McCrimmon - an early Dr Who companion. His mother was a big fan apparently.

[Pickle]

Named my daughter Sophie from Sophie in Howl's Moving Castle.

I was looking for inspiration for a name in books and that was one that stood out.

[Dara]

Tassie Dave wrote: "Sky wrote: "whether it is OK to name your kid Lucifer, with it being such a beautiful name but having some negative connotations associated with it. "

"Morning Star" is a beautiful name for a chi..."

My boss has an uncle named Adolf. They call him Harry.

[Joe Informatico]

I have a friend named Devon, which is a perfectly innocuous name. But he's named for the main character of an ambitious but not-particularly-good 1970s Canadian science fiction TV series (starring 2001: A Space Odyssey's Keir Dullea as Devon, and created by Harlan Ellison, who ended up disowning it).

[Fresno Bob]

Pat wrote: "A friend of mine has a daughter called Arwen and another has a son called Logan after Wolverine.

."

We were in the Wolverine movie with Liev Schrieber as his Sabretooth brother, and everytime Liev called Wolvie "Jimmy", my Logan-named 8 year old son would stand up and yell, "His name is Logan!"

[Gaines]

I went to school with a guy named Thorin (named after Tolkien's Oakenshield). I never thought it was a weird name growing up or anything, and only became aware of the reference when we were in high school and I read "The Hobbit" and the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I remember I asked if his middle name was Balin and he snorted.

[Winterking]

My second son was named after a character from the TV series, Farscape. My wife and I loved the show and we absolutely loved Moya's child. Those that know the show, know my son's name. We named him Talyn, after the first leviathan gunship. For those looking at the spelling, yes the gunship was male. Talyn was how his name was spelled in the show. Also this was the nam of Aeryn Sun's father. Like I said my son was named after the Leviathan gunship. Which Aeryn named in honor of her father.

[Trike]

Joe Informatico wrote: "I have a friend named Devon, which is a perfectly innocuous name. But he's named for the main character of an ambitious but not-particularly-good 1970s Canadian science fiction TV series (starring ..."

Starlost! I loved that show! (I was 8.)

[Rosanna]

My daughter's name is Lily Mara. Alas, no she's not a redhead. Lily, partially from Princess Lili of Legend, partially from Lily of the Harry Potter series. Mara, from Mara Jade of Star Wars.

[Joseph]

Trike wrote: "Starlost! I loved that show! (I was 8.)"

I never actually saw the show, but I did read The Starcrossed by Ben Bova, which might be of interest ...

[Gaines]

I <3 Bova's work :-)