# Help Depicting Names



## P.A. Trujillo (Apr 7, 2020)

So for my fantasy world, I am using the languages of our world to create names for my fictional characters, countries and kingdoms. But I don't fully trust Google Translate, so I am seeking the help of anyone who knows any language other than English to help me write believable. If you can give me any feedback on how accurate these name are, or how they can be improved to fit the naming conventions of the original language, I would be grateful to hear from you.  

Character names: 
Alvar Danson -- Inspired by Swedish; intended meaning: "Elf Warrior"
Fritjof Hakanson -- Inspired by Swedish; intended meaning: "Thief of Peace"
Asmund Vegardson -- Old Norse; intended meaning: "God Protection"
Unnr Vegardottir -- Old Norse; intended meaning: "To Wave(?)"

Adelsigg -- Inspired by German; intended meaning: "Noble Victory"
Baaghnadee -- Inspired by Hindi; intended meaning: "Tiger River", or "River of the Tiger"
Keakahakai -- Inspired by Hawaiian; intended meaning: "Shadow Beach"


----------



## JD Sheridan (Apr 9, 2020)

I highly recommend Baby name sites.  Alvar showed up on the first site I tried, while it claims it is of English origin, it does give the meaning of "Elf Warrior."  Fritjof did not show up on that site but when I used Google to find the name as well as Asmund, they both showed up on  different name pages that returned the same meaning that you have.  There are a sh*t ton of name sites out there.

I took German in high school and college, don't remember much of it off the top of my head from lack of use lol, but Google Translate can be fairly reliable for translating single words.  Their trouble comes in putting together a proper sentence in the right tense with verbs and what not.


----------



## JD Sheridan (Apr 9, 2020)

I didn't leave much feedback lol.  My only recommendation would be not to make the names too difficult to pronounce.  Baaghnadee doesn't seem too bad for me, but then again I have a degree in Linguistic Anthropology so I'm use to pronouncing non-English words lol.  Question though, did you have a meaning for the names Danson, Hakanson and Vegardson?  Since you are using Scandinavian origins, these last names technically mean "Son of" Dan, Hakan and Vergard.


----------



## A. E. Lowan (Apr 14, 2020)

This is my favorite name generator for when I'm looking for a "esque" sort of name. Dwarven-esque or Gaelic-esque, that sort of thing.

Fantasy Name Generator

What I do is hit the button until I have a list of names that I'm happy with, and then I play with them until they're perfect.







We write urban fantasy, so I don't sweat name meanings with fantasy names, but I do use behindthename.com to research name meanings in the modern world.


----------



## ShadeZ (Apr 14, 2020)

P.A. Trujillo said:


> Asmund Vegardson -- Old Norse; intended meaning: "God Protection"
> Unnr Vegardottir -- Old Norse; intended meaning: "To Wave(?)"



One of the books I am working on features a language modeled strongly after old norse. The biggest issue I've run into with this is how different we English native speaker mentally read these names. For example we may read Asmund as (as-mund (flat mind like in mundane or Edmund)) where as it would actually pronounced correctly sound more so like this (Ahz-mhund). Also the definition is a bit less cut and dry for example the prefix As- usually means divine-  or god- so Asbjorn (Az-Byorn) for example is divine bear. Lastly it should be Asmundr (As-mhun-dhiir) and it means something more like god protector/protector of the gods. And Unnr means to wave/to billow however Unna means love. Hopefully this helps some.


----------



## P.A. Trujillo (Apr 18, 2020)

ShadeZ said:


> Lastly it should be Asmundr (As-mhun-dhiir) and it means something more like god protector/protector of the gods. And Unnr means to wave/to billow however Unna means love. Hopefully this helps some.



So the _-r_ at the end of Old Norse names is actually pronounced? Don't Anglicized versions of these names drop the _-r_?


----------



## P.A. Trujillo (Apr 18, 2020)

JD Sheridan said:


> Question though, did you have a meaning for the names Danson, Hakanson and Vegardson?  Since you are using Scandinavian origins, these last names technically mean "Son of" Dan, Hakan and Vergard.



Yeah, I always intended them to mean "son of __". From what I've learned, and unless anyone can correct me if I'm wrong, that's the way surnames work in most of the Germanic countries.


----------



## Darkfantasy (Apr 23, 2020)

To me some of these look near impossible to pronounce and are a bit intimidating. Baby names on line can be a big help and so can the language translator. You just type in English to German. Put a word in and it translates it for you. I do this quite often then I play with the name and make it my own if it's a race that has nothing to do with humans.


----------

