I’ve found long names, and alphabetical sibling names, but this is the first time I’ve spotted a long, alphabetical name that belonged to a single individual.
A baby girl born on December 19, 1882, in West Derby, Liverpool, England, to Arthur and Sarah Pepper was named:
Ann Bertha Cecilia Diana Emily Fanny Gertrude Hypatia Inez Jane Kate Louisa Maud Nora Ophelia Quince Rebecca Starkey Teresa Ulyses Venus Winifred Xenophon Yetty Zeus Pepper
Regarding the name, the Boston Evening Transcript quipped, “Apparently the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children has little power in London”:
(The handwriting on the original birth record is relatively clear, but certain names are hard to make out — this accounts for the spelling differences between my version and the Transcript‘s version.)
Thoughts?
Sources:
- Crockroft, Steph. “Friendless, Windsor Castle and One Too Many: The unusual names given to children in the 19th century.” Daily Mail 17 Feb. 2015.
- “Jottings.” Boston Evening Transcript 3 Aug. 1889: 4.
Cruel, perhaps, but she was probably just known as “Ann Pepper”. Yawn! I find Starkey the most surprising of the names. Yetty the most strange (Yeti?).
This article has a photo of Ann’s birth certificate.
The image is too small to read, but the text of the article says the name is Ann Bertha Cecilia Diana Emily Fanny Gertrude Hypatia Inez Jane Kate Louisa Maud Nora Ophelia Quince Rebecca Starkey Teresa Ulysis Venus Winifred Xenopher Yetty Zeus.
Here are the discrepancies:
-Cecelia vs. Cecilia
-Louise vs. Louisa
-Tereza vs. Teresa
-Xenophon vs. Xenopher
I like so mane of the names in there – Gertrude, Hypatia and Inez, Maud, Winifred.
Xenopher – really? It must be xenophon after the philosopher.
Mostly pretty cool names, but there are a few crazy ones: Hypatia sounds made-up; Quince is a fruit (a tiny apple I think), not a name; Starkey (??!!) is a surname only (& an unusual one at that!); Ulysis is simply a boys’ name spelled irregularly; and the final three are really weird!: Xenophon means ‘foreign-sounding’, but as a name (which was always rare) it’s masculine; Yetty – what can one say, it’s just silly isn’t it! But could potentially be a surname; and Zeus is the King of the Gods – u don’t get more masculine than that!! Oh yeah, plus there’s no given P-name, as that’s the surname’s initial – this actually makes the name non-alphabetical after all!
Finally found an article with a fairly clear picture of the birth record! Have just updated the post and added the link under “sources.”