Invent new names !

[Maciamo]

In this thread, I was explaining how I like names for the esthetic rather than for their association with someone I know. In fact, I tend to prefer rarer names because ordinary ones are banal and lack originality or character. We are not to blame for the name(s) our parents chose for us or the one we inherited from our ancestors. But it would be more interestin to choose our names ourselves.

Many given names are the same in all Western countries (with variants in spelling and/or pronuciation). In China, family names only have one kanji for 1.3 billion people. Given that there are about 20,000 kanji in Chinese, and that most people know at best 6,000, and that only a fraction of these are used in names, that means that hundred of thousands of people share the same family names, and certainly thousands of each family name also share the same given name (only 2 kanji).

So why not create new, international names using our imagination and creativity ?

Here are a few that pass through my mind at the moment (note that they sound quite ancient, and more Aryan too) :

Sardapan
Esegide
Elagabal
...


Disclaimer : these are not names I would necessarily choose for me. I chose "Maciamo".

[Kara_Nari]

Jandalgia
Fifilicious
Bobnik
Elmosina

Haha this is fun! Come on guys, get the show going.
Actually I think I only like Bobnik out of the above.

[Kinsao]

What about 'Kinsao'?

[Tsuyoiko]

I like names to mean something - like my JRef name is a rough translation of my real name. I named my rabbit Iris both because it sounds nice and because Iris was the Goddess of the rainbow, fleet-footed messenger of the gods - and rabbits are fast runners. All my hamsters have been named after heroes of the ancient world. So I don't like names that are picked just for the sound. Our names are part of our family history. If I have a son I will name him Joseph, after my brother, uncle and grandad. I was named after Byron's lover. I will shut up now, but basically I like names to have meaning.

[Kinsao]

I also agree with Tsuyoiko... it is nice for the names to have a meaning. I like them to have a nice sound somehow, but also the meaning to make them more interesting and... something... I don't know.

It's also nice to use family name, in her case Joseph... but it can go a leeetle too far. In my family we have so many Davids we have to sort of 'tag' them - big David, little David, cousin David, etc. etc... It doesn't help that David is a fairly common name in the UK anyway, so, I have quite a few friends called David, too... cue holiday David, university David, theatre David... .... use with caution!

[Mycernius]

I had a friend that named her daughter Lishana. They took a few favourite letters and came up with it.
How about:
Hyuio - A name I used to use on computer games
Jusina
Bohumba
Kayremra

[Evan Fitz]

Interesting to see your mind is unaffected by the education system's attempt at refining it.