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For the character I am currently working on, I need to pick a noble sounding british last names, but I don't know that many. The character's name is Sara, but what last name can go with it? Any ideas, anyone?
Posts: 3389 | Registered: Apr 2004
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By "noble-sounding," do you mean that the character is in fact descended from British nobility? Because there are actually geneologies you can peruse online, if that's the case. Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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If your looking for british nobility, i would go with the tudor family, they had Elizabeth I, and Henry VIII
Posts: 220 | Registered: Apr 2005
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Any name that isn't a profession name might do pretty well for sounding-wise, although there have been more modern nobility with basic-sounding names. Names of castles and names of stately homes can help give you some ideas. You can look at names of towns and cities, too. Although I'd steer away from really famous towns like London, Cambridge or Oxford, or really common-sounding ones like Newmarket or Leeds .
Names beginning with Fitz... Fitzwilliam, Fitzgerald etc. are always good. "French" names are another option, think Tess of the D'Urbervilles or Little Lord Fauntleroy. It depends what you're trying to convey.
Double barreled names, such as Sara Howard-Misslethorpe are traditionally more stuck up. Especially if one of the names (or both) is very long and silly like Misslethorpe.
Really, anything goes.
EDIT: I want to make exceptions but I keep thinking of titled people with the name. Like Lady Jane Grey, for example, although I don't think Brown, or Jones would really convey what you are trying to convey.
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I got a good laugh at those, but Dorthonion is an elvish name. I'm thinking that Sara Knightshayes sounds pretty noble to me.
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quote:Names beginning with Fitz... Fitzwilliam, Fitzgerald etc. are always good.
*giggles* In Norman days (I'm pretty sure that's when it was) the prefix "fitz" was added to a name to designate a recognized bastard child. *giggles*
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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Yep. But by the 17th/18th century, a large number of those families had become long-standing members of the nobility.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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Alt- How about the last name NobleBritishName? It could be a real name and make people laugh at the same time!
Posts: 6026 | Registered: Dec 2004
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quote:*giggles* In Norman days (I'm pretty sure that's when it was) the prefix "fitz" was added to a name to designate a recognized bastard child. *giggles*
Yup. I know .
But William the Conqueror was a bastard child himself and it never stopped him from being awesome.
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