Unusual Given Names

[Miss Chicken]

In the Middle Names thread rofeta tells us that his middle name is Liumani, a name I have never heard before.

Can you think of any person with a name that is unusual enough that he/she is the only person you have ever known with that name? It can be first or middle names.

I can think of a few unusual names in my family

Aldinga (my grandmother's half-brother)
Eldred Lavington (another of my grandmother's half-brothers)
Hoadrena Rosevear (my grandmother's full sister)

One of my school friends had a sister Dimity and another school had a sister Gaynor and I have never meet anyone else with those names.

 

[JustKate]

My husband's grandmother's name was Drura (pronounced DREW-rah). Never heard it until I married into this family. A Google search turns up some references, but many are (1) neither American nor even European, and she was definitely of European stock, (2) last names rather than first names, or (3) fictional characters. There was apparently a Drura Sehpt of Somahtur in a Superboy comic. Somehow, I don't think this particular Drura would have been amused, but I could be wrong about that.

 

[GeorgeKirk]

When I worked Tech Support one of our customers had a little boy named Kryzton.

 

[Venardhi]

I knew someone named "Handsome", and someone named "A" and a friend's mother was named "Shangrila"

 

[Terengo]

One of my (male) customers is named Twig.

 

[iguana_tonante]

I'm the only one I personally know with my given name. I know there are some others around (very few, but still), but I'm the only one I know face-to-face or on-line.

As far as the Internet is involved, I'm also the only one with my first-name last-name combination because they are both very rare and unsual. And I actually think it's not impossible that I'm the only one on the planet.

For obvious reasons, I'm not telling what they are!

 

[jamestyler]

The first thing that came to mind is a friends son Cage. Middle name Atom.

I've known a Rayah and Lila which is uncommon but not too out of the ordinary. I went to school with an Emily... doesn't seem all that odd at first, but he was a boy. There was just a bit of hide the sausage when he was born, so they gave him a girls name.

It's been mentioned before, but my daughter being called Ezri will likely live to haunt her. She's two and people already have issues pronouncing it - sometimes by getting it way wrong, sometimes by assuming it's the Biblical pronunciation instead of Trill.

 

[Kommander]

My guitar teacher (and lead guitar for semi-famous rapper Hush) is named Cyamak (pronounced: SEE-Mack). He's Iranian, so I'm guessing his name is too. He usually uses the quasi-phonetic spelling "Cmak" because it looks cool on the interwebs.

 

[General_Phoenix]

Know a person with the name Endymion. I think it's a kinda cool name.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

As far as I am aware, I am the only person in the world with a name such as my own.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

I'm the only one I personally know with my given name. I know there are some others around (very few, but still), but I'm the only one I know face-to-face or on-line.

As far as the Internet is involved, I'm also the only one with my first-name last-name combination because they are both very rare and unsual. And I actually think it's not impossible that I'm the only one on the planet.

For obvious reasons, I'm not telling what they are!

I have a fairly uncommon Italian surname and a Scandanavian first name. The combination would probably only meet in America where there are even less people with my last name. So I think it's fairly safe to say I'm the only one with my name.

 

[captcalhoun]

my mother's middle name is 'Eunice'.

there's a woman who comes in my shop with a kid named LJ. SERIOUSLY. This is in fucking rural Britain not Buttfuck, Alabama.

 

[DS9Continuing]

I went to school with a guy named Paxton.

And a distant family relative is named Xanthe (pronounced ZAN-thee). Apparently it means "yellow."

 

[auntiehill]

One of my best pals in College was named Desma. They were twins---Desma and Delphi. I have never since met anyone with those names.

When we were first looking for a home, we met two young real estate people--one was a young Asian immigrant named, I kid you not, Hi. I mean, what do you say to him, "Hi, Hi!" Even worse,his last name, unfortunately, was Ho. Hi Ho. I can't imagine the crap he had to put up with.

The other real estate person was a short, heavy-set woman named Sweeta and her last name was Lemons. Miss Sweeta Lemons. Who in the hell would do that their daughter?

When I was a kid, there was a boy on our swim team whose legal name--not a nickname, mind you--was Happy. I always thought that was a bit of a risk. What if he grew up to be a manic-depressive?

 

[Miss Chicken]

I have only ever meet one

1) Braddon - named after a Tasmanian electoral division, he is the son of a friend
2) Trentley - the nephew of a former boyfriend
3) Hedley - but he is always called Joe
4) Yolanda - girl I used to babysit (though the name is no doubt more common elsewhere in the world
5) Mehmet - another child I used to babysit (no doubt this name is extremely common in some countries)
6) Dove - the daughter of my ex-husband's cousin
7] Leto - nephew of a former boyfriend. if I remember correctly he is named after a character out of Dune.
8) Django - a student I knew, He was named after the jazz musican Jean "Django" Reinhardt. According to Wikipedia Django is Romani for "I awake".

 

[auntiehill]

^Actually, I've known 3 or 4 Yolandas. Not all that uncommon.

I don't think Hedley is all that strange, just very old fashioned. I've only known 2 Hedleys in my life, both of them were over 65.

 

[thestrangequark]

I had a friend in grade school named Storm. There was also a girl in my 1st grade class named Athena, which is awesome, and another named Ivy, which isn't unusual in itself, but is notable because she was born en route to a downtown Seattle hospital in a traffic jam on I5. I recall my older sister havig a high school friend named Jeffery -- she was a girl. My stylist just had a baby girl and named her Ronin; they call her Ro for short and I think that's lovely. I also have a friend whose son is named Aurelius, which is not all that common and particularly unique for a child who is half Black, half Chinese. My grandfather's name was Diswala, which means "Water from the River," (he's NA).

Teaching in NYC I've had so many students with uncommon or unusual names that these days I'm taken by surprise when a kid has a common name like Patrick or Michele. In the past I've met children with names like Ramses (which is also awesome), Muhammadu (that's not a typo, it has an oo at the end), Ohany, Tajinay, Montana, Jiyamalex, Samanesh, etc. And forgive the generalization, but working in the neighborhoods I do I've also met a hefty share of Dreams, Destiny's, Diamonds, Princesses, and so on.

 

[RoJoHen]

One of my best friend's is named Wilder.

That's about all I got, though.

 

[John Clark]

I used to work with a chap called Sim (Simeon in full). I believe it's not that unusual, but he's the only person I've met so far called that

 

[Marc]

Aldinga (my grandmother's half-brother)

That has to take the cake as an unusual name. The only entry in Wiki for Aldinga is the suburb about 45kms south of the Adelaide CBD.

Aldinga turns up 160,000 entries in Google but they all seem to relate to the suburb.