Looking through the birth announcements in the Scottish newspapers of the last few months-a site which also sometimes include the regions just below the Scottish border and the Isle of Man–a couple of prominent trends jump out.

First of all it’s the nickname names, which right now seem to be even more prevalent in Scotland than in England, for both girls and boys, with a plethora of Ellies and Evies, Alfies and Archies.  Here is a list of  recent ones, with some of the middle names attached to them (separated by slashes):

girls

CHARLEE

CHARLI

ELLIE May

EMMIE

EVIE May/Rose/Elizabeth/Harriet

(Alexa) GEORGIE

GRACIE May

IZZY Henderson

JOSIE Mo

LIBBY May

LOTTIE Aoife (pron. EE-fa) (more…)

Max, the name of both the child hero and the young actor who plays him in Where The Wild Things Are, is one of the hottest boys’ names these days.

Max can stand on its own or may be a short form of the ancient Roman name Maximus, which means “greatest,” or of Maximilian or Maxwell.  It’s one of the down-to-earth cigar-chomping grandpa names last popular a hundred years ago and enjoying a huge revival now.  Like brothers Sam and Jake, Max is unpretentious and friendly but also sounds cool.

Celebrities led the way in launching the revival of the name, starting in the late 70s and early 80s.  Stars who are the parents of now-grown kids named Max include Dustin Hoffman, Henry Winkler, Steven Spielberg, and Nora Ephron & Carl Bernstein.

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Guest blogger and name lover Eleanor Nickerson, aka nameberry’s own Elea, tells us all about the exotic and gorgeous names from Cornwall, the exotic and gorgeous region in the southwest of England.

The first time I visited Cornwall was at the tender age of one. Sadly, my dad’s abiding memory of that holiday was a grouching baby grizzling all through his long-awaited sailing trip (something he has yet to fully forgive me for to this day). A few years later my parents bravely returned again, one more child in tow, and fortunately much fun and sandcastle-building ensued.

It wasn’t until several years later when I returned to the region as a fifteen year-old that I was truly able to appreciate the breath-taking beauty of the Cornish coast and countryside. In the intervening years since my last visit I had developed an avid, border-line obsessive, passion for names and their meanings. What struck me was that many houses were named instead of numbered, and these place names, along with those adorning road signs, quickly caught my attention both due to the foreign sound to English ears, and the similarity to my greatest name-love: Welsh names.

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We recently looked at girls’ names popular around the world yet exotic-sounding in the U.S. and other English-speaking countries, and today we turn to the boys’ version of this kind of name.

If you’re looking for a name for your son that has an international flavor yet is not too obscure or difficult to understand and pronounce, you might want to consider these choices.

ALESSANDRO – A top name in Italy, makes Alexander both softer and sexier to the American ear.

ALEXEI – Russian spin on Alex or Alexander popular there, pronounced Alex-ay or (less popular) Alex-ee. Down side: Its similarity to the very popular girls’ name Alexa.

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They’re not like those jaunty Irish surnames that kind of jump out and hit you in the face–no way you could see Finnegan or Donovan as anything else.  But Scottish surnames, somewhat more subtly, have affected American nomenclature to a surprising degree.

Many that could pass for Irish or English are actually old Scottish clan names, and several have long been accepted as first names in this country–a list that includes Allan, Bruce, Douglas, Leslie, Mitchell, Murray, Stewart, Gordon, Lindsay, and, of course, Scott.

Scottish surnames are divided into two groups: Highland and Lowland.  Highlanders didn’t use fixed family names until relatively late–until the 1700’s a man was often designated by his father’s name or would adopt the last name of a laird to curry his favor.  It was the Gaelic Highlanders who used the prefix ‘Mac‘ to denote ’son of”.  (more…)