MetaBob
Literotica Guru
- Joined
- Sep 13, 2018
- Posts
- 3,103
I started writing a medieval-fantasy smut story. It would be a novel-length one. I didn't know what I'd do with it when I finished it (post it here or self-publish it), but I had panned a wonderful story, and I was progressing with no major problems.
Until someone pointed out that the names I used were not medieval enough and sounded anachronistic. So I searched among medieval names, but they all sounded bland and forgettable (Henry, Edward, Richard, Mary, Elizabeth etc.)
So, unable to find proper names for the characters of my novel, I gave up. Oh well.
This should not be a difficult problem to resolve. From an article:
the most popular medieval names were classic, familiar choices including Alice, Isabella, and Emma for girls, and William, John, and Henry for boys.
...
these names were so common that creative nicknames had to evolve to distinguish one from another. Many traditional nicknames and derivatives emerged in the Middle Ages, including Bess, Hal, and Ellen. Others survive today only in surnames, such as Jenkins — Jenkin was a nickname for John— and Perrin, a variation of Peter.
Along with Alice and William, other medieval names that currently rank in the US Top 1000 include Amira, Beatrice, Dante, Ellis, Emmeline, Lucia, Roger, and Walter. Rare and intriguing medieval names worth reviving include Amabel, Cyprian, Isabeau, and Lucan.
Explore s'more!