The Victorian Duggars

[mango_fandango]

I was also thinking of Friends  funny how popular culture influences names. Khaleesi is growing in usage for example. 

[lumpentheologie]

I'm in my mid-30s and knew at least two Emma's in college. It's not as common as Emily in our age group, but it's not strange or anything.  

The first time I heard the name Aidan was in Sex and the City, and I always figured that made it more popular. (Research shows it broke into the top 100 boy names in 2001, so maybe I'm not wrong? Aiden was originally a less-popular variant, but then later overtook the 'a' spelling.)

[singsingsing]

I think there’s a pretty good chance Michelle would not have survived her first twin pregnancy in a true ‘Victorian Duggars’ situation, yeah.

As for Khaleesi, I think Daenerys is a nicer name.

[meee]

Yeah, the first twins were an emergency C-section, I think. Not sure when those became the norm, but probably not Victorian era. 

Then again, she was on the pill between Josh and the twins, right? So would Victorian-era Michelle have had another kid between them?

[catlady]

13 minutes ago, meee said:

Yeah, the first twins were an emergency C-section, I think. Not sure when those became the norm, but probably not Victorian era. 

i can't confirm this, but there is a story in my family that my grandmother was born via c-section in 1923, and that it was a very risky procedure at the time.  there is no one left alive who would be privy to the details.  great grandma had no other children; this was her first, and she was 22. 

so i'd think that 2 or 3 decades earlier, even if it were available, there would have been a good chance that Elizabeth Kate Ruark wouldn't survive.

[singsingsing]

17 minutes ago, meee said:

Yeah, the first twins were an emergency C-section, I think. Not sure when those became the norm, but probably not Victorian era. 

Emergency C-sections have been done throughout history, but they pretty much always resulted in the mother's death (actually, they were usually performed after the mother had already died) until at least the mid-late 19th century, and I think even then the mortality rate was super high. So the twins might have survived, but the odds for Michelle still would have been really bad, unless she had been able to deliver naturally.

[neurogirl]

My SIL's name is Emma and she's turning 30 this summer. MIL said she wanted a classic name that wasn't super popular, and then the name Emma exploded. 

For reference, her other children are Peter, Philip, (Emma), and Thomas. They are a (very nice!!) very E coast preppy family with English heritage, so it works.  

[JordynDarby5]

15 minutes ago, neurogirl said:

My SIL's name is Emma and she's turning 30 this summer. MIL said she wanted a classic name that wasn't super popular, and then the name Emma exploded. 

For reference, her other children are Peter, Philip, (Emma), and Thomas. They are a (very nice!!) very E coast preppy family with English heritage, so it works.  

My sister-in-law tried that too. She has a name that was very popular growing up and hated it because it was a pain. Everywhere she goes there's tons of women with the name. Going going to school with so many girls with the same name. A couple had the same last name as her too. One of them always ditching school and the school always confused the girls and called my sister-in-law's parents. When she was pregnant with her son she looked for a name that wasn't popular because she didn't want her son to have to deal with that. They picked a Biblical name that wasn't popular at then time. Then it exploded. 

[Vivi_music]

10 hours ago, JermajestyDuggar said:

That’s definitely when it went up in popularity. Emily was very popular at that time too. When a name gets very popular, names similar to it become popular too. Aiden was first popular, then the names that rhyme with Aiden became popular after the rise in Aiden. Names like Brayden, Jaden, Caiden, Hayden all became more popular. Emma was probably slightly on the rise due to the popularity of Emily, but then it likely exploded in popularity after Rachel named the baby Emma.

I am on board with the whole generational name problem in pop culture: TV, movies, even books.

If we talk about a story set now , I suspect these mistakes come from the fact people don't know how name cycles work. I actually had it explained in a sociology class. It was a bit more complex but in a nutshell: parents usually look for names that THEY themselves have not heard much growing up. Hence someone my age won't name their baby Jessica, Ashley or Ryan because they probably have experienced being in a class with 4 Jessicas. So parents try to find something they have not heard much in their generation. Usually it has to be unique enough, but not too far off so the child won't be teased. Which often means parents without realizing it, think of the same names. It can also explain why the choice often falls on old names, old enough to not be associated with your grandparents and not too weird either. Then at one point yes, if a name if up and coming, it will gain a popularity as more and more babies are named that way and other parent hear it more. Then it will die off of its own popularity and over-usage. I am maybe not explaining this perfectly, because college was a while back, but I loved that some sociologists took time to analyze the phenomenon and put it on paper.

If it involves time periods that are further back in history, I think it is partly lazy. It is relatively easy to search online and look at the names what were common in Tudor England. It would say... one thing that bothers me most is the combination of historical innacuracy and language. Names that are not only historically innacurate but also not true to the culture the story is supposed to be set in. This probably is because my first-language is not English. But dang... no aristocrat lady living at the court of Louis the XIVth would have been named Esmée. It is kind of annoying when you can speak the language and know it is (and was) not a named commonly used.

[mango_fandango]

I like writing stories for fun. Most are set in England so I already know the popular names, but when I came up with an idea for one set in Germany I googled common German names. Funnily enough I believe Emma is the most popular girls’ name of last year. Many of the names on the list would be found in other cultures too. 

There will always be some names that are “classic”/not obviously from one era. 

[metheglyn]

22 hours ago, catlady said:

i can't confirm this, but there is a story in my family that my grandmother was born via c-section in 1923, and that it was a very risky procedure at the time.  there is no one left alive who would be privy to the details.  great grandma had no other children; this was her first, and she was 22. 

so i'd think that 2 or 3 decades earlier, even if it were available, there would have been a good chance that Elizabeth Kate Ruark wouldn't survive.

Queen Elizabeth II was born by C-Section (at her maternal grandparents' London house!) in 1926 as well. Of course, QEQM (then Duchess of York) had access to excellent obstetric care as a British royal, but still. The apparent difficulties of the births of Elizabeth and Margaret (born in Scotland, possibly also by c-section) were reportedly a strong reason why after her uncle abdicated it was assumed that Elizabeth would eventually be queen (despite being only heir presumptive), as it was considered highly unlikely that QEQM would have more than two kids. Whether that was through choice or necessity, it's an indication that in the pre-WWII era c-sections were not something that it made sense to have a lot of kids after.

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

Someone needs to do a hipster version of Duggar names. 

[viii]

As a name nerd, I am SCREAMING over this. Millard Dillard and Hymen Murtha. GOOD LORD. 

[Beermeet]

How fun!  My death bed hath been ruined yet again. : /

@singsingsing  Thanks!

[PlentyOfJesusFishInTheSea]

15 hours ago, Vivi_music said:

 But dang... no aristocrat lady living at the court of Louis the XIVth would have been named Esmée.

I hate-read a romance novel once set in the 1880s wild west and the French immigrant heroine was called Sharisse! Hahahaha, the French don't even have an SH! It also has the absolute best/worst cover of all time (which is why I picked it up):

https://www.fictiondb.com/author/johanna-lindsey~tender-is-the-storm~23389~b.htm

[catlady]

2 hours ago, PlentyOfJesusFishInTheSea said:

I hate-read a romance novel once set in the 1880s wild west and the French immigrant heroine was called Sharisse! Hahahaha, the French don't even have an SH! It also has the absolute best/worst cover of all time (which is why I picked it up):

https://www.fictiondb.com/author/johanna-lindsey~tender-is-the-storm~23389~b.htm

Interesting that the guy is naked. I have an old one from the early 90s that I bought for the sole reason that the man on the cover appeared to be Fabio. It’s still somewhere in my house. 

[elliha]

In the early days of c-section it was also quite common to do a hysterectomy instead of stitching the uterus up as one of the major risks besides infection was the woman bleeding out and what would happen with the next pregnancy. So the most successful surgeons that really did save women's lives often went for this option. If no further pregnancy was possible then at least there would not be necessary to perform more than one c-section on a woman in a time when the risks were very high.

Before c-sections a solution might be to cut the baby up in uterus and have the woman deliver the parts. That way her life was spared and she could have another go later to have a living baby. If the baby was just big and she did not have a deformed pelvis the next pregancy might be more successful. Going through such deliveries must have been heartbreaking for the women but their lives were spared and hopefully some of them could having living babies before or after. 

[What the Fundie]

My great Aunts were born in the 1890’s which is the Edwardian Era? They were triplets which was really rare then. Their mother named them all “Z” names. Zelpha, Zora and Zoe. Zoe was pronounced with a long o. Not like Zoo but like oh. I remember meeting them in the early 1960’s at a family picnic when I was very young. They never married and ended up staying in the family home their entire lives. They were original Jana’s. 

[Satan'sFortress]

Using the methodology, I would have been Bertha Belle.

[AnnEggBlandHer?]

3 hours ago, Satan'sFortress said:

Using the methodology, I would have been Bertha Belle.

Margaret Sudie, at your service 

(Sudie???) 

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

Julia Anna here.

[SorenaJ]

Agatha Aura. 

[Audrey2]

Greetings from Maude Mabel, but I won't tell you which year.?

[mango_fandango]

I remember that one of the fundies we follow, someone who writes books (not Sarah Maxwell), decided to do a book set in 1910s England, and the main character was called... Jaeryn. Not only that, she then did a “character interview” with him, where one of the questions asked was what clique he’d been in at school. Honey, no. English schools just do not have cliques. Friendship groups, sure, but they aren’t like American high school films. They’re pretty fluid and not defined by a particular characteristic eg nerds, sporty types, party animals etc.

[nastyhobbitses]

On 3/26/2019 at 2:28 AM, Vivi_music said:

If it involves time periods that are further back in history, I think it is partly lazy. It is relatively easy to search online and look at the names what were common in Tudor England. It would say... one thing that bothers me most is the combination of historical innacuracy and language. Names that are not only historically innacurate but also not true to the culture the story is supposed to be set in. This probably is because my first-language is not English. But dang... no aristocrat lady living at the court of Louis the XIVth would have been named Esmée. It is kind of annoying when you can speak the language and know it is (and was) not a named commonly used.

I don't read/watch Outlander, but this issue bugged me so much when I read some synopses to see if I'd be interested in the show: I don't know if the situation was the same in Britain/Ireland, but Brianna wasn't really used as a name in the US until the 70s, if Google/a baby name popularity stats graph is serving me correctly. And in my mind, it's a very early 2000s name. A girl named Brianna in the 1950s sounds very out of place to me.