It was used in "Yesteryear" (TAS). I have no idea if any books used it before that. Incidentally, TAS is also where Kirk's middle name was first revealed to be Tiberius, in "Bem."
Spock's last name
- Thread starter Laura Cynthia Chambers
- Start date
Good point!
The only books before that, episode adaptations aside, were Mission to Horatius and Spock Must Die! So no, it very probably wasn't used in books before that.
Spock's first name is given as "S'chn T'gai" in the 1985 novel Star Trek: Ishmael by Barbara Hambly.
Spock's last name is given as "Xtmprsqzntwlfd" in the 1980 book U.S.S. Enterprise Officer's Manual by Geoffrey Mandel and Doug Drexler. It was DC Fontana who came up with it though, probably as a joke.
Taken verbatim from the Memory Beta Spock Talk Page:
Therin of Andor said:
(I hope Therin of Andor doesn't mind me quoting his Memory Beta post.)
What name is official and/or canon? None. On screen it's "Spock, son of Sarek".
I am glad the other Vulcans identify him as "Spock".
Sargon might know more than Ann. Who you gonna trust? A woman with at least two aliases or a millenea old alien?
Hey @OldManDoom,
Sorry, but the Dick Rock avatar has to go. The Board Admin removed it once already. Please don't use it again.
Thanks, and sorry for the interruption.
Bassinger?
Yes, I'd forgotten about Yesteryear! Has TAS been fully accepted as canon these days?
JB
Well Sargon soon backed off from his theory especially when Spock claimed it might tie in with Vulcan pre-history!
JB
It has been for a long time now, ever since they started referencing it in DS9 and VGR. And Kirk's middle name has certainly been cited in various live-action canonical works over the years.
I don't think it's just a matter of it being difficult to pronounce. Even a difficult word can be pronounced after a few hours practice. Amanda's statement that it took years of practice to only be able to pronounce it after a fashion indicates that it truely is impossible for non vulcanians to pronounce it. So vulcanians must be able to produce sounds humans cannot.
Well, look at those ears. Maybe they can pick up frequencies we can't hear. Maybe "Spock" is just part of his name and the rest of it is ultrasonic.
I don't think that that's the case. Words can be said at any pitch in our language. That's what songs are for. Old Vulcan males would have a much lower pitch than young Vulcan females, so that wouldn't be practical. Or they would have to use different words to say the same thing.
Spock was sworn in to testify in Kirk's court martial and never used any name besides Spock. How official can you get?
Official when on Vulcan that is, which makes sense because to Starfleet he's one Vulcan among a handful that belong to Starfleet. To Vulcan however he's one among several billion, the risk of homonymy is multiplied by a million or more. I never believed that monosyllabic names were sufficient to name billions of people without risk of confusion, did you?
In our language. This is an alien language. Why assume it must follow the same rules, when there are already plenty of Earth languages that don't follow the same rules as English?
Though much has been made of ears, hearts, blood, and pon farr, we have never been educated on the structure and function of the Vulcan larynx. They may be able to make sounds Humans cannot but rarely display this ability.
Interesting question: Is "Spock" an actual Vulcan name? It is a real name here on Earth, and since Spock's mom is from Earth, it could be possible that that's where it came from. (I'm actually don't think this's the case, but it's a really interesting question, IMHO.)
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