Discovering Latvian Roots » given names

“Fearless Females” – March 3

Antra — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 02:55:41 +0000

Today’s prompt: Do you share a first name with one of your female ancestors? Perhaps you were named for your great-grandmother, or your name follows a particular naming pattern. If not, then list the most unique or unusual female first name you’ve come across in your family tree.

Well, the most unusual name in my family tree is my own – Antra. I wasn’t named for anyone, it was a name my parents saw in the Latvian name calendar and liked. It is not a particularly common name – growing up, other Latvian-Canadians would ask me if my name was Latvian, and I, confused, since I knew my name came from the name calendar, would tell them that it was. I only know two other Latvian-North-Americans with this name.

It is more common in Latvia though – nowhere near the top of the list, but popular enough that I can find pre-printed items with my name on them. It is more popular than names that I thought were quite common, such as Zinta and Krista. Despite modern-day (relative) popularity, I have yet to see it in any old record.

Women’s names in my family do not seem to follow any sort of pattern. A count of women’s names in my family tree (my name included, direct line only):

Anna – 4.
Ieva – 3.
Līze – 2.
Aina, Antra, Dorotea, Ēde, Jūle, Kače, Karlīne, Kristīne, Lilija, Marija, Mārīte, Mērija, Mīle, Vija, Zenta – 1.

There we have 18 names, 24 individuals. Anna and Ieva still remain some of the most popular female names, though the popularity of Līze has dropped off dramatically. Other names, such as Aina and Vija, I haven’t seen anywhere in old records, even though they are very popular now. Names that appear frequently in old records, such as Mīle and Jūle, are almost unheard of these days.

Tomorrow: – marriages! And hopefully I’ll get my post on farm names up as well.

Forename Friday – Fire and Light

Antra — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 05:01:42 +0000

Today’s Forename Friday is dedicated to given names that relate to fire and light.

This is an interesting category, because so many Latvian names come from it. But as I’ve mentioned before, even though there are many names in this category, the PMLP personal name database shows that for the most part, they are not frequently used.

The most popular names relating to fire and light are both womens’ names – Ausma (“dawn” or “daybreak”) has 4670 entries (name day June 26) and Vizma (from “vizmot”, “to shimmer”, “to glitter”) has 1031 entries (name day August 26). The most popular male name of this category is Auseklis (“morning star”) with only 124 entries (name day December 14).

Names relating to “spodrs”, meaning “bright” appear as well – the feminine Spodra (309 entries, name day January 4), the male Spodris (120 entries, name day January 28) and the female diminutive Spodrīte (44 entries). Also related are Blāzma (“glow) with 3 entries (name day February 8), Gaisma (“light”) with 37 entries (name day December 14) and Spīdola (from “spīdēt”, meaning “to shine”) with 25 entries (name day February 2).

But what about fire? While no names come up with “uguns” (“fire”) as an element, there are flames and sparks – Liesma (283 entries, name day September 18) and Dzirkstīte (diminutive of “dzirksts”, 58 entries, name day December 7), respectively.

In Latvian stories and myth, Spīdola and Auseklis both come into play. Spīdola is a character in the Latvian national epic “Lāčplēsis”. Auseklis is one of the gods of the Latvian pantheon. “Dzirksts” is also the name of a popular Latvian chamber choir in the Toronto area. They celebrated their 25th anniversary last year.

Do you have any fire or light names to share? Any Latvian ones that I missed?

Forename Friday – “Laime”

Antra — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 05:26:56 +0000

The genea-blogging community has Surname Saturday, so why not Forename Friday? This is not meant to exclude those from cultures where given names appear after surnames, but there is no day of the week starting with a G for “given name”, so this is the next best option. Feel free to participate in talking about given names regardless of your culture’s name order.

I’m going to use this weekly prompt to discuss Latvian given names that are unique to the Baltics. They are a bit less common than ones that are a part of the “common European heritage”, but do appear with increasing frequency, particularly in diaspora communities. Many of these names or variants of them are also Lithuanian, due to the close relation between the Latvian and Lithuanian languages.

A quick primer on Latvian given names: Nouns in Latvian are gendered, masculine and feminine. Proper names are no exception. Just like for other nouns, male names always end in “s” or “š” in the nominative form. This is a grammatical rule and I believe a law as well – Latvia has a series of language directives that tell how names from other languages are to be translated to Latvian, and this usually includes making male names end in s or š. Women’s names end in “a” or “e” (surnames usually follow this same rule, but are a bit more flexible, and I will get into this at a later date).

Latvian names also appear in a “name calendar”, where each day of the year has several names attached to it. Latvians celebrate name days with flowers and gifts. I’m told that they used to be considered more important than birthdays, but the tradition seems to be going by the wayside in the modern world. You can view a Latvian name calendar here (interface in English).

A useful tool for finding out the popularity of Latvian given names is this site by the Latvian Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs (this page is available in Latvian only). You enter the name, and click search (“meklēt”), and it brings up the number of people in the Latvian Population Register with that name and that name in combinations (in the case of middle names). It does not appear that the total displayed for the main entry includes the combinations as a part of its total. However, due to the time-consuming nature of counting them all together, for my posts here I am only going to use the total displayed for the main entry.

The most popular Latvian names are names related to the common Judeo-Christian/Greco-Roman/etc. heritage of Europe. Names such as Jānis (John – 58,627 entries), Marija (Mary – 19,036 entries), Kristīne (Christine – 14,785 entries), Juris (George – 18,694 entries) and Anna (Anne – 25,962 entries) are all quite common.

But back to the uniquely Baltic ones!

Today: Names that are variations on the word “laime” (luck, joy, happiness).

Laima is the most common female variant, with 2366 entries and the name day on February 11 (it is also a popular name in Lithuania). Laimonis is the most popular male variant, with 1648 entries and the name day on October 29. The other “laime” variations with more than a hundred entries are Laimdota (see below) and Laimons (a spelling variation of Laimonis) with 684 and 434 entries respectively.

In the old Latvian pantheon, Laima is the chief goddess of luck and fate. Laimdota (literally “given joy” or “given by joy”) is the name of the main female character in Lāčplēsis, the Latvian national epic. Other name variants on “laime” include Laimute, Laimīte, Laimnesis (“bringer of luck/joy”), Laimdots, Laimrota, Laimis and Laimutis. Interestingly, “Laime” does not appear as a name.

The goddess Laima often appears in a trinity with the other two fate goddesses, Kārta and Dēkla. The name Kārta does not appear in the register at all, and Dēkla has only one entry, and this entry is as a middle name.

Laima is also the name of the biggest Latvian chocolate manufacturer. The Theodor Riegert company was founded in 1870, and was a large chocolate manufacturer in the Russian Empire. After Latvian independence, those operations were taken over by the Laima company in 1924.

Does your language have any names relating to luck, joy or happiness? How popular are they?