Drake Llewellyn was named shortly before he was born. We'd agreed to the name Drake. It is a family name on DH's side & if you go back far enough they are related to the Elizabethan privateer Sir Francis Drake. I am all about all things Tudor, so I agreed easily enough to Drake. A tradition in DH's family is to give the first born male a first name of Llewellyn. Wasn't going to happen to my kid. I cannot see calling a toddler Lou and I don't like Louie. In my family you name the first born male after the maternal grandfather. These traditions combined would have given the poor kid the name Llewellyn Byrd. DH has an older brother, not named Llewellyn, who also did not name his son Llewellyn, so I felt justified in nixing it. DH wasn't that attached to the idea anyhow. As I was waiting to go into my c-section I agreed to using Llewellyn as a middle name.
Derek Raleigh was named for a character in a Douglas Adams book and the Elizabethan privateer Sir Walter Raleigh. Derek is named for Dirk Gentley of "Dirk Gentley's Holistic Detective Agency" and "Long Dark Teatime of the Soul". Dirk is a variation of Derek, something we discovered when we looked it up in the Baby Name book. Derek was going to be named Dirk, or Adam (after Douglas Adams) or Seth (just because I liked the name). We couldn't decide so we waited to see what he 'looked like' when he was born. He wasn't a Dirk or a Seth. For a little while he was Adam, but that didn't fit, then we called him Duncan for 24 hours, but that wasn't quite right. We started going back through the name list and came upon Derek (which had been added merely as a curiosity because it's where Dirk comes from) and we *knew* his name was Derek. I chose his middle name when the lady with the social security paperwork said "and the middle name?". Adam, Raleigh and Byrd were in the running. Raleigh is what came out.
If we had another son he would be named Dirk Henry (for the privateer Sir Henry Morgan. I like having a theme). Had we had a daughter she would be Devon Elizabeth.(Devon is where most of the privateers were based out of & I really like the name and Elizabeth for Elizabeth Tudor)
Monday, June 26, 2006
what the names mean
6 comments:
So have the boys adjusted to having such bigger than life names to live up too? I think they are great.
Wow, you really thought deep about names! Amazing and something wonderful to tell them where their names come from one day!
I loved how you tried on the names first. I was supposed to be a boy so I believe my dad was very disappointed, because rumor has it that I was called Lawrence for the first 24 hours and my dad wouldn't even hold me. Apparently he felt so guilty after that because I'm a daddy's girl and he spoiled me rotten!
I have always liked your choices of first names, and their middle names are just as great! I just love it when people put so much thought into the history of the names and even make sure the name "fits". Great stories!
Both those names are favorites of mine as well, and the story about ds #2 is great. It's sometimes hard to find the name that just 'fits'!
Love how you used the history theme! You are well prepared with two more sets of names!!?
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