Hatrack River Writers Workshop: A replacement name

This is topic A replacement name in forum Open Discussions About Writing at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by Monolith (Member # 2034) on :

I have a question or more like a predicament.
I've been told that the name of my lead character is Welsh. ( Bad, I know. I've had that name since high school )
But I have done my research and I've found a site for ancient greek names, now out of the list of the following names, which one would hold your attention the most? Yes these are all male names.

Tzittas Kyros
Verazes Draco
Trasaric** Nikandros
Rogatus Phocas
Synesius Solon
Nilus Thales
Helias Tycho
Decius
Callistus**
Bacauda
Attalus**

The names in the second column I added just in case. The ones with asterisks are the ones that I like better.

-Bryan-

[This message has been edited by Monolith (edited July 16, 2004).]

Posted by Balthasar (Member # 5399) on :

This is for your lead character? Then none of them. For lead characters, I prefer shorter names, one or two syllables. (Also, becasue of my college background, I'm not a fan of Greek names; they sound, well, like Greek names. So you might want to dismiss my remarks.)

What exactly is wrong with the original name? What does it matter that it's Welsh?

If you can find it, a good resource is THE WRITER'S DIGEST CHARACTER-NAMING SOURCEBOOK.

[This message has been edited by Balthasar (edited July 15, 2004).]

Posted by rickfisher (Member # 1214) on :

He needs a Greek name because the lead character is Greek, and the story takes place in ancient Greece. A Welsh name would be odd, to say the least.

Of those listed, I prefer one of Nilus, Helias, Decius, or Attalus.

[This message has been edited by rickfisher (edited July 16, 2004).]

Posted by shadowynd (Member # 2077) on :

Depending on what time period your story is set, the Welsh name could still work. After all, Rome did occupy what is now Britain for a time. Was your character born there? Have a father or other relative that served there that brought back the name as a fancy? It could still work!

And I really like the name, too. I cheated and looked back in F&F for your story beginning. Maybe it's worth slightly altering your character's background in order to justify the name? *g*

Susan

EDIT: Greek, silly me... that's what I get for pulling up this site when I'm sleepy. Still, you could probably figure out a way to explain it, you'd just have to work a little harder at it?

[This message has been edited by shadowynd (edited July 16, 2004).]

Posted by Phanto (Member # 1619) on :

Do not pick Solon. It will make me think of the Greek Tryrant who deprived Greek peasents of farming equpiment. Do not use Decius, because that makes me think of Shakespeare. (Alright, this is just me.)

Ummm....I agree with choose something short and sweet.

Posted by Balthasar (Member # 5399) on :

Well, that changes my opinion. IF your character is Greek, and, more importantly, IF your setting is ancient Greece, then you certainly need a Greek name. My comment about not liking Greek names has to do when I see them in medieval fantasy or SF--they remind me of Homer and Sophocles and a few others.

Of the three you like the best--Trasaric, Callistus and Attalus--I like Callistus the best. Trasaric seems too hard to pronounce, and Attalus reminds me too much of Atlas.

Posted by djvdakota (Member # 2002) on :

My personal favorite is Tycho. Does Tycho necessarily need to be a last name? Don't know much about Greek. It's short, sweet, easy to pronounce, strong sounding. Then you could play a little more with the last name--it doesn't matter so much what it is, how it's spelled, whether it's pronounceable, because you'll rarely have to deal with it in the text.

Posted by MaryRobinette (Member # 1680) on :

Here. Of them, I liked Kyros best. My reasons are below. I didn't repeat any of the ones that others disliked because I thought there reasons were good.

Tzittas - (souns too much likes titsass in my head)
Kyros - Like this one
Verazes - sounds Italian
Draco - Harry Potter antagonist
Phocas - (also mispronounces in my head unpleasantly)
Nilus (sounds like a wimp. Might be Niles on Frasier triggering that)
Thales (reminds me of Thames)
Helias (too close to Helios, and there are myths about him.)
Tycho (acutally, I think this is a toy company)
Decius (only if he's the tenth child)

Posted by Christine (Member # 1646) on :

None of the names exactly roll off the tongue. I agree with Balthasar on this one wholeheartedly...hero's names need to be short, sweet, and simple to remember. If I'm concentrating on remember a 4 syllable name with strange syllables that I'm not familiar with, too many consonants, too many vowels, or especially some unclear pronunciation, I hae trouble concentrating on the rest of the story. I point this out to people in critiques from time to time, but it never goes anywhere. It seems many pepole are very attached to their character names and aftera ll, in their minds, they know how it's pronounced. I digress...

About the Greek names...I don't like any of them. Have you considered something like ALexander? That's a Greek name and its length is counteracted by its familiarity. There are other Greek names that are shorter and/or more familiar to us that you might want to consider.

Posted by HSO (Member # 2056) on :

You know what might help... tell us what this character is really like. What are his strengths and weaknesses. What is his personality? His he easily frustrated? Shy and Quiet? Loud? Strong? Weak? Fearful? Cynical? Pessimistic? Because, with all of this, it may become quite a simple task of recommending a name -- either based on Greek mythology who is similar, or just current names and their meanings.

Of course, you could always just make up a Greek-sounding name, right?

Posted by Monolith (Member # 2034) on :

HSO-

I thought that Toriyn was a decent sounding Greek name. And then to have it smashed down, well that wasn't so good. But all in all, I've been having the love/hate thing going on with this story.

But as to his personality: He's a hunter, strong, confident, and can be cynical. He's also a good leader and strong warrior. ( Both of these he doesn't know yet)
He's a well-rounded man, knows his limits as well as his weaknesses.

-Bryan-

Posted by HSO (Member # 2056) on :

Jason comes to mind... but then that's my name... so, I'm biased. :P [I know what you're all thinking right now... what's up w/ HSO?]

I meant Jason and the Argonauts -- that Jason.

But then, Jason is heavily used in today's names anyway.

I'm heading out to the gym shortly, and then it's off to have a curry w/ my wife. But, if you haven't decided on a name by tomorrow morning my time, I'll be glad to do a bit of web research for Greek names...

[This message has been edited by HSO (edited July 16, 2004).]

Posted by Balthasar (Member # 5399) on :

There is some truth in trying to give your hero a familiar name. It's not only easy to remember and pronounce, but it makes him or her familiar to your readers.

To use a name such as Jason, Paul, Justin, Alexander, Ignatius, Cyprian, Cyril--names that are more or less familiar to a modern audience--will help your reader fall into your fictional dream. Then you can use more obscure names for those characters your hero meets, and the names themselves become a metaphor or symbol of the strangeness of your hero's adventure.

Posted by HSO (Member # 2056) on :

http://www.nameandfame.org/greek.html

First site that came up on altavista's search engine.

Search was for "Names in Greek Mythology."

"AltaVista found 278 results"

Posted by GZ (Member # 1374) on :

quote:
To use a name such as Jason, Paul, Justin, Alexander, Ignatius, Cyprian, Cyril--names that are more or less familiar to a modern audience--will help your reader fall into your fictional dream.

I'd have to disagree with that. Names like Alexander, Paul, Ignatius are emotionally and thematically charged because they already have other stories/history so closely attached to them. It doesn't ruin anything to use them even if you aren't drawing on that previous history, but I don't see the familiarity particulary helps you step into the new ficitional world -- in fact, some readers might bring extra information to it that has nothing to do with what you are going to accomplish.

Of your list, I like Trasaric the best. The other ** ones work too. But there are others on there that I would just read along with and not care particularly. With unfamiliar names that still appear pronounable and fit the setting (which these do), I do a best guess pronuncation, and leave it at that. (Audiobooks can be a big surprise ) It's not the actual name of any character that will make me love him, but what he does.

[This message has been edited by GZ (edited July 16, 2004).]

Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :

Monolith, what does Toriyn mean in Welsh?

If it means something that you could translate into a Greek word, and then create a name from that Greek word, maybe that would work for you.

Or you could take one of the traits that you used to describe your character and find the Greek word for that. Find an ancient Greek dictionary on the web and look up hunter, strong, confident, leader, warrior, and maybe cynic, and see what those give you.

It doesn't have to be a real Greek name, just one that sounds Greek. (And some of the names you've listed actually sound more Latin--to me, anyway--which I think would tend to defeat the whole purpose in finding a Greek name.)

Posted by wetwilly (Member # 1818) on :

Ignatius? Cyprian? Cyril? I don't think I'm part of the modern audience to which these names are familiar.

Posted by Robyn_Hood (Member # 2083) on :

quote:
But as to his personality: He's a hunter, strong, confident, and can be cynical. He's also a good leader and strong warrior. ( Both of these he doesn't know yet)

The first name that came to mind when I read this was Orion. I don't know if you'd want to go in that direction though.

I tried to find information on naming conventions for ancient greece using Google but couldn't sort the info before lunch

Good luck!

Posted by djvdakota (Member # 2002) on :

Have you checked out www.behindthename.com? You can search names by country of origin, among other things. Great site for finding some unusual names from all over the world.

Posted by Monolith (Member # 2034) on :

After searching an english-greek dictionary, I've found the following:

strong= dynatos, ischyros,romales
hunter= kynigos
confidence=emprotosyni
cynic= kynikos
leader= archigos
warrior= polemistis
boss = αφεντικό, διευθυντής, προεξοχή, καμπούρα, εργοδότης, αρχηγός, διευθύνω
afentiko, dieythyntis, proexochi, kampoura, ergodotis, archigos, dieythyno

Orion according to behindthename.com:
was a legendary hunter killed by a scorpion sent by Artemis

so if any of these hit a nerve with any of you out there let me know.

-Bryan-

[This message has been edited by Monolith (edited July 16, 2004).]

Posted by HSO (Member # 2056) on :

If I had to choose out of those: Archigos.

my two pence (cents).

Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :

I wouldn't vote for Orion, because readers may think you are writing about the original Orion.

You could do a sort of pun if you gave him the name Kynigos (since it's so close to Kynikos), and have Ares call him a cynical hunter at some point. (I'd vote for that name just so you could do the pun, but I'm weird that way.)

Posted by punahougirl84 (Member # 1731) on :

-os looks like a good ending. Kyros combines strong and hunter nicely, sounds good, is simple and easy but not weak.

Probably want to avoid Dyngos!

Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :

How about Lykos? It means wolf, it's short and sweet, and strong sounding, and not particularly reminiscent of anyone, so far as I know.

Posted by Monolith (Member # 2034) on :

Just a little bit more info. I did a little more digging and found that Mrs. Kathleen was right.

Lykos=wolf**
Arkouda=Bear
Tavros=Bull**

I'll probably decide within the next couple of days as to which name I'm going to choose.
You guys have been so helpful.
In fact this has given me more inspiration.
You guys are great. Thanks a ton.

**= I like these

Posted by Gwalchmai (Member # 1807) on :

Out of your original suggestions I think I prefer Attalus. Lykos doesn't work for me because of the search engine with the same name. However, the ancient Greek for wolf is also quite often transliterated as Lukos, which could solve that problem.

quote:
To use a name such as Jason, Paul, Justin, Alexander, Ignatius, Cyprian, Cyril--names that are more or less familiar to a modern audience--will help your reader fall into your fictional dream.

I like the idea, especially that they are easy to pronounce because that would get annoying after 500 or so pages, but those names, despite their origins, either don't sound Greek enough to me and so would seem out of place in a text alongside more traditional Greek names, or are too unfamiliar--Ignatius, Cyprian. How about:

Cimon
Giorgos
Nikolaos
Philippos

Greek names but close enough to their english equivalents for people to associate with them. A couple of other Greek names off the top of my head:

Aktaion
Alcidas
Battus
Hippias

[This message has been edited by Gwalchmai (edited July 17, 2004).]

Posted by Silver6 (Member # 1415) on :

Lykos does have a search-engine problem. I don't like Lukos because it's much too close to Luke.
I liked Attalus, although truth to tell it doesn't exactly sound Greek to me...I'd have said Roman or Macedonian (and the Romans didn't come to Greece until years after what we know as Ancient Greece, - the warring cities, including Athens and Sparta, and everything - had been destroyed by the Macedonian invasion).
You might try not "wolf", but "dog" (they are used for hunting, and the word "hunter" derives from the word dog - the word cynic as well, incidentally, which is why they are so close)
Dog is "Kuon". Genitive "Kunos". There's the option of making the upsilon into a "y", thus "Kyon" and "Kynos". As far as I know, there's no particular association with any of these.

Posted by Monolith (Member # 2034) on :

Here's my final 5 choices, before inserting the name into my story:
Out of these 5 which one is best?

Callistus
Kyros
Trasaric
Tasvros
Lykos

As always you guys are helpful.

-Bryan-

Posted by HSO (Member # 2056) on :

If I say Kyros, does that mean you'll pick something else? (just kidding).

My second choice from the list would be Trasaric. Easy to say, sounds noble-ish and strong.

Callistus immediately brings to mind Callista Flockhart (sp?) and Ally McBeal... but that's just me.

The others I'm not very keen on, but there's nothing wrong with them... except for Tasvros because the consonants SVR are together and to my American eye it looks funny.

Best of luck choosing a name.

Posted by Silver6 (Member # 1415) on :

Kyros. Second choice Callistus, but it sounds more Roman than Greek. Callistos? (the most beautiful one? boy, is that a name fit for a hero... :-) )

[This message has been edited by Silver6 (edited July 19, 2004).]

Posted by Christine (Member # 1646) on :

Callistus -- sounds like a girl's name
Kyros -- not bad
Trasaric -- doesn't roll off the tongue
Tasvros -- doesn't roll off the tongue
Lykos -- not bad, even better than Kyros, IMO

Posted by Lullaby Lady (Member # 1840) on :

I'm liking Kyros!

Posted by shadowynd (Member # 2077) on :

Is it too late to vote? I cast mine for punahougirl84's Kyros or Silver6's Kyon.

Susan

Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

Kyros!!!

Posted by punahougirl84 (Member # 1731) on :

Gee, can I vote twice?

Out of your choices, for reasons already mentioned, I still like Kyros best.

Posted by Monolith (Member # 2034) on :

This is according to behindthename.com

CYRUS m
Usage: English, Biblical
Pronounced: SIE-rus
From Kyros, the Greek form of the Persian name Kûrush, which may mean "far sighted" or may be related to the Persian word khur "sun". The name is sometimes associated with Greek kyrios "lord". This was the name of several kings of Persia, including Cyrus the Great, who conquered Babylon. He is famous in the Old Testament for freeing the captive Jews and allowing them to return to Israel.

So Kyros is getting more attention.

HSO- It's TAVROS no 's' before the 'v'.

-Bryan-

Posted by Gwalchmai (Member # 1807) on :

FWIW I agree with just about everybody else with regards to Kyros.

Posted by Lorien (Member # 2037) on :

Lykos was going to my vote, but wolves are not usually good in mythology (but, I don't know why).

Therefore, I also vote, Kyros, "far sighted" seems like a good soild characteristic to me!

Posted by J. Alfred Prufrock (Member # 2114) on :

I would venture that it's down to Lykos v. Kyros, both stronger names than the rest, and both remarkably to-the-point as far as names go.

To me, the deciding factor would be the character himself. I find that, generally, a character whose name compliments his personality is much more effective than one that does not -- the connotations of a name are very powerful things.

Write a short bit about a character named Kyros, then write a short bit about a character named Lykos, and see which one matches your actual character the most. To me, Lykos sounds just as it means; when I think of the name, it implies to me a man who is gaunt, cunning, and works best with a trusted friend or two, instead of alone or with a large group. He doesn't let things get in his way, but he's not rash, either.

Kyros, on the other hand, to me, creates the color red and a ruthless image, a man better suited to be a villain than a hero. He's smart but headstrong.

Granted, though, the connotations of a name are largely relative, so take this with a grain of salt. Just my opinion on it.

Aesthetically, I like Lykos better, though it reminds me of a half-rate Search engine.

[This message has been edited by J. Alfred Prufrock (edited July 20, 2004).]

Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :

It appears to me that if you want to make a name look more Greek and less Latin/Roman, you change the -us ending to an -os ending:

Callistus -> Callistos (or Kalystos)
Decius -> Decios (or Dekyos)
Cyrus -> Kyros

Posted by Robyn_Hood (Member # 2083) on :

I like Lykos but do feel it lacks a certain -- Umph! It has a softer, more understated sound. Kyros on the other hand is far more agressive and masculine sounding.

$0.02!