In the history of baby naming, rarely has a new name taken off with the supersonic speed of
Nevaeh. Its surge was spurred by one singular event, the announcement by
Christian rock star Sonny Sandoval of his baby’s name on MTV in 2000, when he explained that it was “
Heaven spelled backwards.” Sandoval didn’t invent the name–in the previous year there had been eight other baby girls called
Nevaeh, but there can be no doubt that his public announcement was what triggered the explosion.By 2001, it had leaped up to #226 on the popularity list, and four years later it entered the Top 100. On last year’s list, it reached #31, obviously striking a chord with the many parents who didn’t actually want to go all the way to
Heaven.
Palindrome Names
There have always been a number of names that are palindromes — spelled the same backwards and forwards, such as
Ada,
Ava,
Hannah,
Otto,
Eve,
Anna,
Aviva, et al–but that differs from the
Nevaeh model. This got us to thinking about which other names might do a similar about face as a way of creating something new and truly original. Already there is some use of the name
Semaj (
James spelled backwards) among Rastafarians, inspired by Leachim
Semaj, a Jamaican activist, psychologist and radio host whose birth name was
Michael James.
Exotic Reversals
Here are a few other exotic reversals, giving a nouveau twist to an old name. You could probably come up with some more yourself–perhaps as a way of creating a namesake for someone you wish to honor:
ADAJ from JADA
ADIA from AIDA
AMABALA from ALABAMA
ARON from NORA
LEXA from AXEL
LEZAH from HAZEL
NAJ from JAN
NEELIA from AILEEN
NEVAH from HAVEN
REVILO from OLIVER
SIANA from ANAIS
SIRI from IRIS
SITO from OTIS
ZENI from INEZ
Tags: Heaven spelled backwards, Nevaeh, palindrome names, popular baby names, Sonny Sandoval, twin names, unique baby names
This entry was posted
on
Thursday, December 18th, 2008 at
1:39 am and is filed under
Uncategorized, creating names, different spellings, name games, name ideas, twins, unique baby names, unusual baby names .
You can follow any responses to this entry through the
RSS 2.0 feed.
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
December 18th, 2008 at 2:54 pm
That was really neat for me since I like palindromes. Or, .semordilap ekil I ecnis em rof taen yllear saw tahT !