American Language Supplement 2 (100 page)

Despite the seeming chaos here the judicious reader will at once observe certain patterns and tendencies. Many of these names, he will note, are more or less plausible and euphonious modifications of common male names, usually by the addition of suffixes generally thought of as feminine,
e.g., Philelle, Ulyssia, Lloydine, Alexanderene, Oscaretta, Alburtis
. Others are diminutives of male names, often given a feminine flavor by combining them with accepted women’s names,
e.g., Bennie Mae, Jimmie Lou, Mary Jo
. Yet others are surnames converted into given-names,
e.g., Beverly, Sidney, Shirley, Dabney, Powell, Shelby
. And still other are geographical names – sometimes used unchanged,
e.g., Manila, Sonora, Elba
, and sometimes modified to please a whimsical fancy,
e.g., Texana, Utahna, Arzonia, Denva, Melbourine, Okla, Venazualia, Hiburnia
. All these processes, though they have been carried further in the Fancy Names Belt than anywhere else, have roots in the past. The ancient German man’s name of
Albert
produced
Alberta
at a very early date, and there was a saint thus called in the Third Century. So with
Julia
, which comes down from Roman times and was borne by a saint of the same era. So, again, with
Philippa, Theodora, Henrietta, Caroline
and many another. So, even, with
Sophia
, which was originally one of the Names of Jesus, and hence masculine, though it was transferred to women in Apostolic times and has been accepted by Holy Church ever since.
⁵
Mary Jo
and their like may be traced to the day before surnames, when it was common to distinguish between two women of the same name by appending their fathers’ given-names. Nor is there anything precisely new about giving girls surnames as given-names: it apparently came in simultaneously with the custom of using such names for boys. Camden says, in fact, that
Douglas
was thus adopted in England shortly before his time, and Henry Howard, Earl of
Northampton (1540–1614), had a daughter of that name who became the wife of Sir Arthur Gorges, the cousin and companion of Sir Walter Raleigh, and was herself the subject of a poem by Spenser.
¹
This use of surnames as given-names for girls has always been commonest in the South, where it marks the gentry rather than the plain people. But in recent years it has flourished lushly among the lowly of Oklahoma.

Another large class of non-canonical girls’ names is produced by adorning old names with new and mellifluous terminations,
e.g., Carrine, Marcellette, Olgalene
, or by making collision forms of two or more,
e.g., Gracella, Alouise, Hannora, Mariedythe, Harrietta, Agnella, Abbieann
. With it goes a long series of novel abbreviations,
e.g., Affie, Berthie, Oshie
, and another and longer of rococo spellings,
e.g., Cylvia, De Lores, Wroberta, Jayne, Mable, Dasy, Scharlott, Jaann
,
²
Phaye
. Such spellings were once fashionable in the great Babylons of the East, with
Edythe, Kathryn
and
Sadye
as familiar examples, but in late years they have passed out there. In the Dust Bowl and its colonies, however, they continue to flourish, and some of them are of a great boldness,
e.g., Feby
(
Phoebe
),
Gladdis, Rhey
and
Qay
. In some cases their forms suggest that mere illiteracy may lie at the bottom of them, as for example in
Anner, Cloteel, Drewceller, Milderd, Kathern
and
Roxaner
,
³
but it is much more common for a highly self-conscious artfulness to be manifest, and the same is also visible in the lavish misuse of particles, capitals, apostrophes and other such alarms and delights to the eye and psyche,
e.g., ClarEtta, Da Rue, M’Amis, De’An, Du Wayne, G’Ola, Je Nanne, Ja Jayne, La Doris, DeDonda, AlMeda, E-Vetha, Lo Venia, McNara, Del Rose, El Louise, Le Olive
and
La Lahoma
.
⁴
The last example presents a case of doubling of
la
, not at all infrequent in my material, and the two cases immediately preceding show masculine articles used before feminine names. How one is to account for such forms as
Garguerite, Maomi, Orene
and
Omelia
, in which old names are turned into new ones by the simple device of changing
the initial letters, I do not know. It may be ingenuity that operates here, and it may be only ignorance.