Character Names!

[Praybird]

Bouncing off a random thought...we all know (or, well, should hopefully know?) that character names actually carry a ton of context. Hopefully you haven't named your urban fantasy's British character "Guan Yu," or your high fantasy goblin warlord "Mahatma Gandhi." If you did, well...shame on you, I guess.

Anyways! What are some character names you came up with, and what strategy did you use to make them? To list off a few I had...

Felicir: I loosely built this character with Lucifer in mind, and scrambled the consonants to make the name.
Ilias: I tried to think of a name that would be both suitable for a dragon and still somewhat familiar to readers in a good context. Ended up taking the name from the old classic "Iliad."
Parma: Loose romanization of a Korean phrase that literally means "break magic"!...And also a city in Italy, apparently.

 

[Heavenlycapybara]

Name? Is that the thing I ask the GPT chat to generate for me whenever I need something to call a character or place?

 

[Corty]

my method is this:

https://forum.scribblehub.com/threads/cortys-tip-jar.15699/post-341848

 

[TheEldritchGod]

I pick a language to base the culture on. Then I use a random name generator that includes the hidden meaning of the word. Then I usually up a tag word or phrase to exemplify the person. Sometimes I'll then change that word or phrase into latin, then take out the letters from that phrase that match the name I picked, then the remaining letters get turned into the last name, so it's an anagram of a latin phrase that is a clue as to the real nature of the character.

Other times I'll just use numerology to come up with a mystical number square that has the effect I am looking for and convert that into letters, then take the first name out of that to make the name, but that's often too long so I have to add a middle name, usually.

 

[RepresentingEnvy]

I mostly BS names in the moment I make the character. A few times I had asked somebody i was just talking to what they would name a vendor of X. No one has complained tho. My main characters are usually starting with E

 

[TotallyHuman]

Holden Cox is sowing chaos in the city again! But, fret not for Chad Thunderdick has gone out to the rescue!
...Actually, no, let's just random names

 

[BearlyAlive]

I usually smash a few things that relate to certain attributes or roles I want them to play in the story together and see how they sound. Most of the time I tweak them into something I like, but sometimes I end up with stupid names just because they sound fancy. Or just downright in your face with their meaning.

 

[LilRora]

Most of the time, I look up real names that fit the character. That's why the characters in my stories are called, for example, Emmanuel, Jessica, Brian, David, Vanessa. They're all pretty common names, and that's by design. Don't want my average Joe be called Constantin.

Otherwise, I think up some loose connections and twist them a little bit to make them fit. That's where Helia comes from, from Hel, as in sun, cause her power is intimately connected with stars.

If that doesn't work either for some reason, for example when I want an alien character whose name is supposed to be weird or strange or just non-human, I just search for some letter combination that sounds right, gives the impression I want. That's how I got A'ella, who is a virtually all-powerful goddess.

 

[TheEldritchGod]

I suppose I should give an example.

In my superhero story, an antagonists is called the Caffiend.Hus name is Lord Charlton Hieronymus-Nial Od

Caf-FIEND. A pun on Caffeine. What is the chemical for caffeine? C8H10N4O2. How many letters in Lord Od's name? Charlton=8, Hieronymus=10, Nial=4, Od=2

It goes a bit deeper of course. Charlton meaning From The Town Of Free Men. Lord Od being the noble ruling over Odford, which is a play on Oxford. Hieronymus meaning "Sacred name". Nial meaning Champion.

Put it all together, and you have the Sacred Champion and Leader of Free men, on top of it being a pun on Caffeine. Of course, all things are subjective.

One man's Freedom Fighter is another man's terrorist, after all.

 

[Hans.Trondheim]

Bouncing off a random thought...we all know (or, well, should hopefully know?) that character names actually carry a ton of context. Hopefully you haven't named your urban fantasy's British character "Guan Yu," or your high fantasy goblin warlord "Mahatma Gandhi." If you did, well...shame on you, I guess.

Anyways! What are some character names you came up with, and what strategy did you use to make them? To list off a few I had...

Felicir: I loosely built this character with Lucifer in mind, and scrambled the consonants to make the name.
Ilias: I tried to think of a name that would be both suitable for a dragon and still somewhat familiar to readers in a good context. Ended up taking the name from the old classic "Iliad."
Parma: Loose romanization of a Korean phrase that literally means "break magic"!...And also a city in Italy, apparently.

My samples:

Kuro/Greg Santos
Madelaine Ann Rubinforth (Maddie)
Lilyhaven Tamriel von Leese (Lily)
Eris Braunhauer

Yeah, I just put whatever comes to my head the moment I create the character.

But, there are moments where I use 'puns' to name the character, like:

Martelle Hughes
Paula Cole
Lahg Ahri
(from the words "martilyo", "palakol", and "lagari", which are Filipino words for hammer, axe and saw, respectively.)

I don't give much thought on character names; whatever I feel at the moment, I just use it for the name.

 

[CarburetorThompson]

No two main cast characters should have the same first initial. So first I take an unused letter, from there I either add on to it randomly till it makes a word that I think is phonetically pleasing to say, or I search from a list of historical names.

 

[J_Chemist]

Steve. Name them all

Hoopefully you haven't named your urban fantasy's British character "Guan Yu," or your high fantasy goblin warlord "Mahatma Gandhi." If you did, well...shame on you, I guess.

I'll add it to my list of "Useless Things People Dislike That I Should Do".

Thanks.

Tell me why that sounds like a good story idea.

 

[CheertheSecond]

I name the demons in my fic after game companies.

Electrisa Artisha

Drazzilb Activista

Kron Rami

Belrus Thelesta (Bethesda)

Urunbi Sophistopher (Ubisoft)

Nenba Tenlado (Nintendo)

 

[Nevafrost]

I just take random names I saw in different series(s) and see if it fits the character. For example:

Iris Evergarden (From Violet Evergarden)
Aylin Elric (I don't remember this one)
Elina Ackermen (From AOT)
Harlin Hoeinheim (From Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood)
Eren Wistaria (From both AOT and Akagami no shirayuki-hime)
Zen Wistaria (From Akagami no shirayuki-him)
Austin Wistaria (Likewise)
Erwin Wistaria (From both AOT and ANSH)

 

[Prince_Azmiran_Myrian]

or your high fantasy goblin warlord "Mahatma Gandhi." If you did, well...shame on you, I guess.

If this were based off a game of Civilization that name would make perfect sense.

Anyways! What are some character names you came up with, and what strategy did you use to make them? To list off a few I had...

Felicir: I loosely built this character with Lucifer in mind, and scrambled the consonants to make the name.
Ilias: I tried to think of a name that would be both suitable for a dragon and still somewhat familiar to readers in a good context. Ended up taking the name from the old classic "Iliad."
Parma: Loose romanization of a Korean phrase that literally means "break magic"!...And also a city in Italy, apparently.

Sometimes I like to make names that sound good to my own ears. Alliteration can be good for side characters. I spend time brainstorming but sometimes it's just easier to make a name based off the characters traits.

 

[QuercusMalus]

I use this site alot for generating character names:

The Meaning and History of First Names - Behind the Name

Find the meaning, history and popularity of given names from around the world. Get ideas for baby names or discover your own name's history.

www.behindthename.com

You can search first names for hundreds of languages, sorted by masculine or feminine.

Browse Names - Behind the Name

Lists of given names organized by letter, gender, language and more.

www.behindthename.com

Also has a surname site and a random name generator that allows you to specify number of names, language source, ect.

The Meaning and History of Surnames - Behind the Name

Find the meaning, history and origin of surnames, also called last names or family names, as well as famous bearers and usage statistics.

surnames.behindthename.com

Random Name Generator

This random name generator can suggest names for babies, characters, or anything else that needs naming.

www.behindthename.com

 

[l8rose]

I tend to look up name websites unless I'm going for a specific kind of character and then I'll search up what relates to the character or their background. Like a character with an origin set in ancient Scotland would get a name befitting that.

Ironically, I randomly picked a bunch of sounds to combine for my orc Dragonborn's name cause it sounded "orcish" but I apparently picked a bunch of syllables that worked as an actual coherent set of words in Skyrim's dragon language.

 

[Sleds]

Some are random, some are generated. I think the only ones I tried to find a meaning was for two characters with chinese names:
Wen Zhao : "Wen" can mean literature, culture or gentle, while "Zhao" can mean bright, shining or illustrious.
Liu Xing : "Liu" is a common chinese surname, while "Xing" mean Star.

 

[Notadate]

Puns and what U feel rught

 

[doravg]

I admit that I have researched character names before, but for my current project, I just used the first names that came to mind.

Happy writing! I wish you luck with your novels!