Daisy for Margaret: Daisy (the flower) in French is Marguerite. |
Ted for Edward |
I thought Tess was for Teresa/Theresa... |
3 pages and no one's mentioned Bill for William? |
It's Bess for Elizabeth, not Tess. Tess is for Theresa. Sasha for Alexander (Aleksandr) is Russian. The Sa- is from Alek-SA-ndr, and the -sha is the nickname ending (in this case). |
PP, I think you've gotten me wrong. The example you used, Thomas John = TJ/TeeJay, makes total sense. This is a natural nn. The examples I used, Chuck and Sia, are not cases where people "changed what their child was called". These are nicknames that the family uses, but the children are not introduced as these names. Similarly to how you wouldn't say "and one glass of wawa for my daughter." You're right, all nn probably do have a REASON, but some of those reasons are dumb. Calling your kid TeeJay is fine and seems logical. Calling your little Thomas John, CRAIG, while you're still pregnant is weird! Why not just name your kid Craig. (this is just an example name, but I've run into this sort of thing and that is what I'm complaining about). Also, I don't take anything on DCUM seriously, that's probably why I don't think this thread is overly judgmental. I actually enjoy kind of pointless threads like this more than "serious" threads that don't go anywhere and turn into debates about public breastfeeding or when to turn your toddler forward facing (been there done that). |
PP here. Okay, you seem to be reasonable. I'll roll with it. Thanks. |
Betsy for Elizabeth- that's me... And no one seems to get it.
FYI many of us who use nick names didn't choose them. |
Daisy for Margaret is from Maisie as a nn then turned to Daisy. It's actually been around for generations. I like it. |
Tuck for Tom
Bo for Robert |
Many of these old nicknames, as well as the many nn's for Elizabeth, Henry, William, Mary, etc., made sense back in colonial or medieval times when they originated. We might not recognize where they come from anymore, but does doesn't mean the don't make sense. There are a number of theories about where the English nn Jack came from, such as that it was derived from the French Jacques, or that it is a short form of "Jankin" or "Jenkin", which were themselves common pet names for John. (The surname Jenkins means "little John," "kin" being a common diminutive used in England around the 10th-11th century (from the Dutch) and Jen meaning John. In fact the nn Hank actually came from Hankin, which like Jack was a nn for John (from Hans-kin, or little Hans, Hans of course deriving from Johannes). For some reason Hank became used as a nn for Henry in colonial America. Dick may come, believe it or not, from the English inability to pronounce the name Richard as it was pronounced by the Normans who introduced it to England in medieval times. Etc. |
It may have come to be used for Margaret because the French name for the daisy flower is Marguerite. |
Also, in medieval times, there just weren't that many names in use and people had lots of children. It wouldn't be uncommon for a family to have two boys named John, so you needed a nn for one of them. As a result, there were many, many nn's in use. |
Ned for Eddard. |
But it's not a new thing. Check out the others mentioned. Richard and Dick. Robert and Bob. Margaret and Peggy. |