Name Reources
So, you’re writing a thing, and you need to name a character. And, as we all know, naming a character is a giant pain in the ass. I offer this list of shit I use pretty regularly, for this purpose.
Behind the Name (The etymologies are weird as fuck, in a few places, but it’s great if you’ve got a name and need to find other names that are from or derived from the same culture/language)
Behind the Surname (BTN for family names)
Academy of Saint Gabriel Medieval Names Archive (This is the go-to for medieval names in Europe and the Near East. Hardcore scholarship and a distinct lack of fucking around.)
Kate Monk’s Onomastikon (The original internet name resource.)
The Soldier in Later Medieval England (Actual names from English military rolls around the Battle of Agincourt)
England’s Immigrants (Non-native residents of England, 1330-1550)
Celtic Personal Names of Roman Britain
Mapping the Medieval Countryside - People (People appearing in English inquisitions post mortem, 1418-1447)
Wiktionary’s Index of Biblical Names
Ancient Names Galleria (The weird shit is here. If you need Akkadian or Phoenecian names, those are totally covered.)
Trismegistos People (Names extracted from the Trismegistos Texts – mostly names from Graeco-Roman Egypt.)
Personally, I use the shit out of Trismegistos People, England’s Immigrants, and the Ancient Names Galleria. If you’ve got good sources I didn’t hit, feel free to add them in a reblog. I’m always looking for more good name resources. (And almost all of what I have is Europe and the Near East, with a little North Africa.)
Dropping this update in the most recent reblog in my notes, in the hopes it falls into as many laps as possible. Here’s some more good sources for names, this time with a more African focus.
Wikipedia Category: Surnames of African Origin (which is helpfully divided into sections by language)
Wikipedia Category: Amharic Language Names (I believe this list is primarily, if not entirely, given names.)
YorubaName (“an online intervention to preserve and document all Yorùbá names in a multimedia format.”)
Writing Adolescent Fiction: Character names: Kenyan, Tanzanian and Ugandan (a list of given names and surnames with notes on how full names are constructed in each culture listed)
Again, if you know any good sources, particularly for regions I haven’t covered, let me know!
Rebageling with some more good shit:
So You Want to Name a Sino (a fairly detailed guide on how to name a Chinese character without sounding like too much of a moron)
Most Popular Baby Names for Girls Since 1960 (most popular American girls’ names, by state, from 1960-2012, as a gif)
Popular Baby Names (the US Social Security database of naming trends in the US, with search options for date, gender, location, and trend)
A Guide to Names and Naming Practises (a UK government guide to common names and structure of names from around the world, split first by continent and then by culture. PDF.)
Curiosities of Puritan Nomenclature (an entire book on trends in English naming and name structure and the Puritan influence, from 1880. PDF.)
Things I am particularly looking for reliable sources for, if you’ve got them: North and South American aboriginal names, Southeast and East Asian names, names from the former USSR, Australian aboriginal names. (All of these by culture or language family, if possible, not just by current national borders.)
