Names in fashion

I wanted the name Prudence if my grandson had been a girl.
He wasn't though, so that was lucky, since my daughter didn't like Prudence.

My name is very Irish and I wanted to have an English name like the other girls at school - Susan, Jacqueline, Wendy or Gillian! I like my name now.

In our playgroup we have two Alberts, one Alfred, two Fredericks, three Williams, and the girls three Marthas, one Mary, two Constance, four Florence etc., oh and a Darcy and Scarlet.

But no Paulines, Christines, Wendys,.....my original point was that these 50s and 60s names are not used any more. I was at school with three Susans, but I have never known a six year old Susan, and I’d forgotten about those other popular names, Jacqueline and Gillian! Victorian and later flower names-Poppy, Lily, Rosa etc are still used to name new babies, and we had lots of Eleanors, Hannahs, Emilys (I’m just thinking of girls names here.) And what about Barbara? I wonder how names fall out of and into fashion.

The royals influence popularity in names, I'm sure.

I think you can really date someone from their name,mine hasn't been popular since the 50's and everyone I've met with my name is the same generation as me.My daughter has a name thats not popular in Scotland but is apparently common in the south ,so her English husband says and our GC all have fairly ordinary names ,all except one who says she's the only girl with her name and she is ,in her school and neighbourhood anyway.DoraMarr Barbara was my favourite name and my first daughter was called that ,she was born and died in the mid 70S

I read that Victoria Coren and David Mitchell have called their baby Barbara so who knows, maybe it's about to make a comeback. It was always popular with my parents, one of my names,

I find names, I perceive to be of Anglo Saxon origin, such as Edith, Ethel pretty ugly sounding but it seems they have come back, often synonymous with an aged relative not good on a little girl my opinion, I imagine others love that sort of name though, Edie is quite popular at the moment. A name I completely changed my mind on, I hated the name Grace when I was growing up. Changed my mind completely about 15 years ago, I now regard it as classic, timeless and quite sophisticated.

We were standing in a queue with our DGs last week. There were two very madeup, Kardashian lookalike Mums in front of us. They were talking loudly about their friends' children. One child was Indigo, another Saffron , Magenta and Epiphany (?) Bet the parent didn't know the meaning of the last name ?

The way names go in and out of popularity is an interesting subject.

One name may indicate the age of a person, but if you have a group of names, like schoolfriends, you can be pretty sure when they were born.

A lot of my schoolfriends were Margarets or Marys, but there were also Catherines and Elizabeths (which haven't dated so much) and others like Jennifer, Susan, Helen, Linda, Christine, Valerie, Shirley, Barbara, Maureen, Rosalind, Isobel, Frances, Ruth, Marjory, Brenda, Patricia, Pamela, Sheila, Anne, Rosemary, Judith, Wendy, Alison, Gillian, Yvonne, Jeanette and Carol.

I wonder how many GNetters have grandchildren with these names?

I taught a girl called Nike. At parents evening, I remarked that it was an original choice to name your daughter after a Greek goddess. They asked me if Adidas was a Greek goddess too.

I am 66 and there were 5 Lindas in my class. I have never met anyone older than me called Linda.

Linda! They’re all coming back to me now! And Jane, Janet, Sheila....

I thought my name was probably popular in the sixties, so I just looked it up.
It was actually most popular between 1915-1930.
I'm pleased, and I don't know why.

Does anybody know anyone under 60 called Patricia?

Yes, Framilode* one who is around 50 now.

One of my friends is called Evelyn and I hate that name so I call her Eve.

As well as the names mentioned, I went to school with Valerie, Sally, Anne, Brenda, Mary, Agnes , Sheila and Penny

In my class, in the 1950's, the girls were Margaret, Enid, Susan, Janice, Rosemary, Carol, Deirdre. The boys all seemed to be called Stephen or John!

My hairdresser has just named her little son Ronald. ?

I'm trying to remember my class!
Barbara, Margaret, Patricia, Brenda, Susan, Veronica, Beryl, Judith, Diane and Diana, Linda, Marilyn, Rosemary, Ann, Carol, Jean, Lesley - and others.

I haven't heard of any babies called by those names yet.

My hairdresser has just named her little son Ronald.
oh dear - will they call him McDonald - or Maccers?

Vanessa, Christine, Valerie, Sylvia, Pauline (I'm going round the desks )

I don't know any little Ediths, but I think it's a pretty name. The same with Doris.
In my part of the country, family names are still often used so people in their twenties or teens may be called things like Norman or Cyril.

I expect TV shows, films and (in the past) radio shows influence choices of names.

I have a friend with twin boys called Darius and Hector, and a colleague of DH’s called his son Hugo. In our class at school we had a Caroline and everyone thought her name rather exotic. There were a lot of Susans and Christines as I remember.