Characters' Names

[erastes]

I know i've complained about this before but gah!  NAMES! Sometimes I'm sooo tempted to go bananas and leap down the "implausible name route" like Deymien Aztec de Chandon or something.  I've actually started writing today and there i go, tap tap tap - I have the name of the butler and I stick "Mrs XXXX" for the housekeeper because she's not vital - and then I hit the first major male character and GRIND TO A BLOODY HALT.

I go and search for Parish records - and am bombarded with Charles and Edward and George and John -sheesh- all so DULL! Names just drive me bonkers.

Does anyone have any great links?  And no, I don't want baby names sites, I want parish records, or sites with real names!  help help help. Or you may be responsible for me having a Deymien Chandon.  (although that's SO bloody tempting...) I'd like unusual but plausible if you know what I mean.

Comments

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Thank you! *bookmarks*

[busaikko]

I would say the Americans are more adventurous with names! These church records have such gems as:

6 Dec. [1789] Ichabod Marr & Molly Nason.
29 Dec. [1789] John Drew Jr. & Lydia Butler.
23 Feb. 1790 Joseph Hearl & Mary Abbot.
23 April [1790] Thomas Hubbard & Lydia Goodwin.
30 April [1790] Thomas Marr & Mehitabel Huntress.
17 Oct. [1790] Jona Hearl & Mehitabel Spencer.
30 Nov. [1790] Thos Penny & Rachel Abbot.
4 Dec. [1790] Hiram Rollins & Joanna Wentworth.
8 Feb. 1791 Enoch Chase & Prudence Clark.
7 Mch. [1791] Jonathan Hubbard & Frances Parsons.

(http://www.mainegenealogy.net/2006/05/berwick-marriages-1710-1828.html)

... there are also men named Fortune, Temple, and Nahum. (One of my ancestors was named Ivory: he was a sea captain *g* And one on this list is Peletiah, which may be Biblical, I'm not sure: I'm jsut glad it's not hereditary!)

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Thank you - that will be very useful when I do "Fleury goes to America"!

[busaikko]

\o/ Come to Maine: it was apparently a happening place! Or at any rate, in my family, a hotbed of inbreeding and whaling....

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Perhaps Fleury will fall in love with a rough tough whaler with hands like hams...

[busaikko]

Researching the sailing bit would be quite a lot of work... though 2 Years Before the Mast is a great read. Your whaler ought to be a Nason, so I can claim him *g*