Naming Characters.

cwschizzy said:

I'm in the process of naming characters. I'm still in the beginning stages, so I figured this is the best time to ask.

How do you respond to/what do you think of last names reminiscent of WoW? My naming style is close to it right now (Duskcry, Sunstrider, Windweaver).

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Why not? That's the way many old surnames were invented, Potter, Black, Ericson, Everette. Occupations, places of residence, fathers name, something notable about an ancestor, or during the naming itself notable about the person. I wouldn't get too close to the names from WoW, but the naming convention is a solid one.

I remember reading a novel where they believed that the alien culture was "relatively young" because their names were still fairly explanatory: People were named Underhill and Smith and such.

So, I have used that myself: The younger a civilization, the more likely that a name is directly related to something...even though, now a days, we have people named "Ericsson" whose father wasn't named Eric, or someone named Smith whose occupation is wall street investment banker slash stealer of newborn souls.

And our civilization is only five to two thousand years old. Imagine a civilization that is ten or even twenty thousand years old: Even if their technology didn't advance to stupidly high levels thanks to stagnation or apocalyptic events, their names are not likely to be linked to anything directly relatable UNLESS their culture includes that as a naming convention.

That's my general rule of thumb, at least.

Zoombie, that is an excellent point. I'd never thought about that, but it completely makes sense.

I don't really see why this would be unusual. These names might even be passed down as surnames are in English. I guess the reason why it seems unusual... well I see you're in Washington DC, so you may be American? Because of the mix of last names in the US a lot of people have no idea what any given last name means, but more than likely it is descended from some word in some language, like an occupation, place, adjective, first name, title, etc.

I guess if I was reading a book with last names like "Duskcry," or "Sunstrider," or "Windweaver," I would expect a duskcrier, sunstrider, or windweaver to be actual professions/titles that do or did exist in that world, rather than just there to sound cool.

Or a culture where familial surnames stop mattering at all, because we're capable of scanning everyone instantly and knowing their paternal and maternal ancestors for dozens of generations back.

Then we might be back to names simply being descriptive again.

Red hair over there, talking to long nose and shorty.

If your characters' culture would have names like Duskcry, Sunstrider and Windweaver in it, go for it. Just don't have Talemanth Ilharess Windweaver and her best friend from childhood, Bob Smith, unless there's a reason for it.

This is one of those topics that could become incredibly detailed ... or we could decide that it really doesn't matter all that much. Readers will usually accept what we give them as long as it doesn't jar too much.

We have lots of choices:

• single name - usually only in small communities or for someone very famous
• birth name + family/clan name - where the birth name sometimes represents the parents' hopes and aspirations for their child.
• birth name + name of father or mother.
• assumed name - eg a King or a Pope assuming a new name, or someone just deciding to call themselves something different
• names which reference physical appearance - either current or historic
• names which reference jobs (which may or may not still exist) - eg Smith
• names which reference where you came from - eg "Jesus of Nazareth".
• Earned name - Vlad the Impaler, Dr Smith

The naming conventions for a fantasy or sci fi world can tell us something about the world or civilization. Somewhere that places a value on lineage will usually refer to fathers or clans - eg Aragorn, son of Arathorn. Small communities can manage with single word names. Warrior races may refer to feats in battle eg Richard the Lionheart.

For me, names borrowed from computer games tend to sound like ... names borrowed from computer games. It's purely a matter of personal taste, but I like to keep the gaming worlds separate from fiction. I don't like to read about characters "levelling up" or having to find the five broken pieces of something or other, or fighting what are quite obviously end of level bosses.

I think I'd struggle with too many Waveriders or Starscreams or whatever. They sound a bit too cartoony for my tastes.

I'm curious why people often suggest to stick with one naming tradition or convention, where that certainly hasn't been the case in the real world, at least in Europe. Even within one country (the UK) there's an amazing variety of both place and personal names, deriving from the different languages and groups of people who have lived there. Sometimes there are some amusing pleonasms, like the River Avon (avon means river). I knew someone named Hillhurst once, and that literally means "Hill Hill." Some names are the modern English terms for the profession or description (Short, Little, Black, Smith), while others are in other languages that were spoken in Britain in the past.

So is it unrealistic to have a fantasy society that does some mixing and matching of naming styles and conventions (assuming there were different groups of people who have immigrated to or invaded the place over the centuries).

I think it makes sense if the story takes place in a fairly remote and insular place for everyone to have the same "kind" of name, or just a few kinds of names. But few fantasy stories take place, in their entirety at least, in such a setting. At the very least, the boy or girl who grew up in the remote village is likely to leave (or be kidnapped, or join the army or whatever) and encounter people with different kinds of names.

And if it's a fantasy world that's more like the middle ages or renaissance in Europe (and, I suspect, in other parts of the world too), where languages and borders have shifted and there have been migrations and raiders and invaders and different owners of the land over the centuries? Why couldn't it be as diverse in terms of names as a real-world country of a similar type in our world?

There is an amazing variety of both place and personal names in the UK, but different social strata tend to have different sorts of names. 'Profession' surnames tend to indicate lower-class origins, which is one reason Margaret Thatcher, despite being actually posh, managed to get enough support to be Prime Minister.

Someone called 'Windweaver', though, even if it were a reasonable English name, isn't naturally going to be associating with Smiths. Smythes, perhaps, but not Smiths. Even if that actually is a profession, it's unlikely to be on the same lines as smithing, thatching, shepherding, farming, baking, etc. - it's a little too complicated a name for that. Most of the professions (and most 'ordinary' surnames) are just one or two syllables, and Windweaver is three. So Windweaver is likely to be a higher-class name than Smith.

So if you've got a reason - and it doesn't even need to be a 'strong' one - for your Windweaver and your Smith to be associating, cool. Just be aware that in a world where your name comes from your origins in one way or another and where society is highly stratified, what looks like an incredibly diverse list on the surface narrows down fast.

I'm not a gamer (at least of the variety you're referring to), so when I read those names I don't think games. It does create a certain stylistic expectation, though, of something less gritty and more flowery. I don't mean no blood and guts, I mean more of a heroic or romantic angle to the overall story, or more of a complete poetic style, such as Patricia McKillip often delivers. I see no problem with that unless that doesn't match your story.

Theres no law against nicknames either. A lot of cultures allowed for people to choose their own names as adults. In China they called it a "style name." Some more warlike cultures gave boys "warrior names" upon reaching manhood. I think something flowery like Windweaver makes more sense as a self-given name.

I generally use websites like www.behindthename.com for names. Pick obscure and archaic names and you're golden. But that's me. Anyway, occupation names, and names based on first names, are a popular choice in the west.

Personally, I'm a fan of those style o'names. However, I think you have to be careful not to go overboard with them. Very reminiscent of a particular kind of "painted fantasy" - Bold and bright and colourful, and it definitely reminds me of videogames. Not sure I've read anything like that. I'd certainly be willing to try it.

It's preferable to Dak'oth of the Gru'ulak Kingdoms, that's for sure.

I get character names from baby name books--and I often choose names that mean something specific. For example, a character who is a fire mage from Irish descent might be named Aidan (Gaelic for little fire).

I usually surf for names on the web: baby names in Old English, Hawaiian, etc.