For other uses see Name (disambiguation). This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (June 2007) Ceremonies such as baptism can be used to give names.

A name is a word or term used for identification. Names can identify a class or category of things or a single thing either uniquely or within a given context. A personal name identifies a specific unique and identifiable individual person and may or may not include a middle name. The name of a specific entity is sometimes called a proper name (although that term has a philosophical meaning also) and is a proper noun. Other nouns are sometimes more loosely called names; an older term for them now obsolete is "general names".

The use of personal names is not unique to humans. Dolphins also use symbolic names as has been shown by recent research.1 Individual dolphins have individual whistles to which they will respond even when there is no other information to clarify which dolphin is being referred to.

Care must be taken in translation for there are ways that one language may prefer one type of name over another. A feudal naming habit is used sometimes in other languages: the French sometimes refer to Aristotle as "le Stagirite" from one spelling of his place of birth and English speakers often refer to Shakespeare as "The Bard" recognizing him as a paragon writer of the language. Finally claims to preference or authority can be refuted: the British did not refer to Louis-Napoleon as Napoleon III during his rule. Contents 1 Etymology 2 In mythology 3 In religious thought 3.1 Biblical names 3.2 Talmudic attitudes 4 Technical names for names 5 Naming convention 5.1 Brand names 6 Literary names 7 Name Generator 8 .name domains 8.1 Ethnic names 9 See also 10 References 11 Further reading 12 External links Etymology

The word "name" comes from Old English nama; akin to Old High German (OHG) and Sanskrit namo Latin nomen and Greek (onoma)2 possibly from the Proto-Indo-European language (PIE): *nomn-.3 In mythology

In Arthurian mythology part of the code of honor and chivalry practiced by knights is that a knight who loses a duel must reveal his name to the victor. It is considered a breach of honor or decorum to reveal one's name before combat. A frequent topos is that a defeated knight will after revealing his name ask the victor what his name is: if the victor turns out to actually be a much more strong and famous knight (e.g. one of Arthur's knights) the loser actually saves face because he was beaten by a knight obviously held to already be stronger than him and thus there is no shame in defeat. However if a strong and powerful knight is defeated and the victor turns out to be a relatively unknown and not particularly strong knight it is a grave humiliation. As a result of this pattern it is considered extremely odd within the rules of Arthurian society when a knight refuses to take off his helmet or reveal his identity even after he has won a duel. Sometimes this results from the victorious knight simply not knowing his own name as was the case with Lancelot and Percival during their early careers; this inability to reveal their own name even in victory led many to incorrectly assume they were trying to intentionally insult the vanquished. A major exception to this rule is Sir Gawain: Gawain considers himself to be the greatest of his uncle Arthur's knights and he feels that his honor is so great that he does not need to hide from revealing it. Thus at the opening of any duel Gawain will simply openly announce "I am Gawain" as it will not diminish his honor to reveal it. In religious thought Further information: Names of God

In the ancient world particularly in the ancient near-east (Israel Mesopotamia Egypt Persia) names were thought to be extremely powerful and to act in some ways as a separate manifestation of a person or deity.4 This viewpoint is responsible both for the reluctance to use the proper name of God in Hebrew writing or speech as well as the common understanding in ancient magic that magical rituals had to be carried out "in someone's name". By invoking a god or spirit by name one was thought to be able to summon that spirit's power for some kind of miracle or magic (see Luke 9:49 in which the disciples claim to have seen a man driving out demons using the name of Jesus.) This understanding passed into later religious tradition for example the stipulation in Catholic exorcism that the demon cannot be expelled until the exorcist has forced it to give up its name at which point the name may be used in a stern command which will drive the demon away. Biblical names Main article: List of biblical names

In the Old Testament the names of individuals are meaningful; for example Adam is named after the "earth" (Adam) from which he was created. (Genesis 2)

A change of name indicates a change of status. For example the patriarch Abram and his wife Sarai are renamed "Abraham" and "Sarah" when they are told they will be the father and mother of many nations (Genesis 17:4 17:15). Simon was renamed Peter when he was given the Keys of Heaven. (Gospel of Matthew 16).

Throughout the Bible characters are given names at birth that reflect something of significance or describe the course of their lives. For example: Solomon meant peace and the king with that name was the first whose reign was without warfare. Likewise Joseph named his firstborn son Manasseh (Hebrew: "causing to forget") as a gesture of forgiveness to his brothers for selling him into slavery. Biblical Jewish people did not have surnames which were passed from generation to generation. However they were typically known as the child of their father. For example: (David ben Yishay) meaning David son of Jesse. In a sense they used their fathers' first names as their own last names a practice done by most Muslims today. Similary to Jewish names the "ben" is in place by "bin" or "ibn" for males "binte" "binti" or "ibnu" for females to Muslims. Sometimes names include "Al-" "Ali-" "-allah" "-lah/-llah" or "-ullah" as it means "a servant to God" or "God's servant". They would sometimes indicate the place they or their child live in. Talmudic attitudes The Babylonian Talmud maintains that names exert a mystical influence over their bearers and a change of name is one of four actions that can avert an evil heavenly decree that would lead to punishment after one's death. Rabbinical commentators differ as to whether the name's influence is metaphysical connecting a person to their soul or bio-socio-psychological where the connection affects his personality appearance and social capacities. The Talmud also states that all those who descend to Gehenna will rise in the time of Messiah. However there are three exceptions one of which is he who calls another by a derisive nickname. A myth is a message that is passed on from generation to generation. Technical names for names Names for names Name of a... Name of name Person Anthroponym Place Toponym Body of water Hydronym Ethnic group Ethnonym False name Pseudonym Author writing under an assumed name Pen name or pseudonym Item named after a person Eponym Other names -onym-suffixed words. Naming convention For Wikipedia's own naming conventions see Wikipedia:Article titles A naming convention is an attempt to systematize names in a field so they unambiguously convey similar information in a similar manner. Several major naming conventions include: In astronomy planetary nomenclature In classics Roman naming conventions In computer programming identifier naming conventions In computer networking computer naming schemes In the sciences systematic names for a variety of things Naming conventions are useful in many aspects of everyday life enabling the casual user to understand larger structures. Street names within a city may follow a naming convention; some examples include: In Manhattan roads that go across the island (East-West) are called "Streets" while those that run the length of the island (North-South) are called "Avenues". Manhattan streets and avenues are numbered with "1st Street" being near the southern end of the island and "219th Street" being near the northern end while "1st Avenue" is near the eastern edge of the island and "12th Avenue" near the western edge. In Ontario numbered concession roads are East-West whereas "lines" are North-South routes. In San Francisco at least three series of parallel streets are alphabetically named e.g. Irving Judah Kirkham Lawton Moraga Noriega Ortega Pacheco Quintara Rivera Santiago Taraval Ulloa Vicente Wawona. The same tendency is seen in the Back Bay neighborhood of Boston Massachusetts where Arlington Street is followed by roads to the west running parallel to it and named Berkeley Clarendon Dartmouth Exeter Fairfield Gloucester and Hereford. In Washington DC east-west streets towards the south (toward the Potomac River) are lettered A B C... omitting J to avoid confusion on street signs and addresses but after these are exhausted to the north the streets are named with simple words in alphabetical order omitting a few letters such as "x". The first cycle of names consists all of one-syllable words; then followed by a cycle of two-syllable words; then followed by a cycle of three-syllable words and before these are exhausted Maryland is reached. (Washington has north-south streets that are numbered going from west to east.) In Montgomery Alabama the old major avenues are named for the Presidents of the United States in their order of entering office omitting John Quincy Adams. Hence these streets are Washington Ave. Adams Ave. Jefferson Ave. Madison Ave. Monroe Ave. Jackson Ave. but not much farther than that. This was just the old plan from a long time ago and it was eventually dropped. For example there is not a Buchanan Ave. a Lincoln Ave. or a Johnson Ave. In Brampton Ontario different sections of town all have streets starting with the same letter and the alphabetical order reflects chronology. In Phoenix Arizona roads east of Central Avenue are termed streets while those west are Avenues. Large corporate university or government campuses may follow a naming convention for rooms within the buildings to help orient tenants and visitors. Otherwise rooms may be numbered in some kind of a rational scheme. Parents may follow a naming convention when selecting names for their children. Some have chosen alphabetical names by birth order. In some East Asian cultures it is common for one syllable in a two syllable given name to be a generation name which is the same for immediate siblings. In many cultures it is common for the son to be named after the father or a grandfather. In certain African cultures such as in Cameroon the eldest son gets the family name for his given name also giving names such as "Thomas Thomas" (but the names are not European names like this one). In other cultures the name may include the place of residence or the place of birth. The Roman naming convention denotes social rank. Products may follow a naming convention. Automobiles typically have a binomial name a "make" (manufacturer) and a "model" in addition to a model year such as a 2007 Chevrolet Corvette. Sometimes there is a name for the car's "decoration level" or "trim line" as well: e.g. Cadillac Escalade EXT Platinum after the precious metal. Computers often have increasing numbers in their names to signify the next generation. Courses at schools typically follow a naming convention: an abbreviation for the subject area and then a number ordered by increasing level of difficulty. Many numbers (e.g. bank accounts government IDs credit cards etc.) are not random but have an internal structure and convention. Virtually all organizations that assign names or numbers will follow some convention in generating these identifiers. Airline flight numbers Space shuttle flight numbers even phone numbers all have an internal convention. Brand names Main article: Brand The process of developing a name for a brand or product is heavily influenced by marketing research and strategy to be appealing and marketable. The brand name is often a neologism or pseudoword such as Kodak or Sony. Literary names In fiction proper names of people or places are often unique to the work in which they appear. Although within the work of fiction proper the name may nonetheless be said to have a certain ethnic origin the name itself may not actually exist. For example the character of Ororo Munro (Storm of the X-Men franchise) is of African descent. Her first name however is not an authentic African name. Names may also be created to either represent ethnic neutrality or corruption of a name with the passage of time. This is a common technique used by science fiction and fantasy writers who may also employ alternate spellings of existing names. Also many science fiction operates on the premise that racial and ethnic boundaries will cease to exist in the future thus producing names that appear to be mixes of different ethnic sources. Yoshiyuki Tomino (creator of the anime Mobile Suit Gundam) is notable for creating character names that are unusual exotic and sometimes silly sounding. Examples include Char Aznable (which is actually based on a real person) Bright Noa Quess Paraya and Marvel Frozen. The science fiction writer Isaac Asimov has also created names which may or may not be variants or corruptions of existing or ancient names. Examples include Dors Venabili R. Daneel Olivaw and Giskard Reventlov. The Star Wars and Dune franchises contains many character names that juggle existing names with created ones; Leia Organa Ben Kenobi Paul Atreides Vladimir Harkonnen. Name Generator A name generator is a program that uses language rules or word combining techniques to generate a list of names. Some common ones include finding your Jedi or stripper name. .name domains According to verisign5 the .name top-level domain name (TLD) is designed for individuals to create a presence and make online communications easy and accessible. Not exclusive to registrars social networking and community sites may also offer .name registration to their members and customers as a value-added service to help establish an individual identity online.6 Ethnic names Arabic name Bulgarian name Chinese name Dutch name Family name French name German name Germanic name Greek name Hebrew name Hungarian name Icelandic name Indian name Indonesian name including single-word names Japanese name Javanese name Korean name Mongolian name Pakistani name Polish name Russian name Saint Thomas Christian names Slavic names Spanish name Vietnamese name See also Anthroponymy Given name List of adjectival forms of place names List of most common surnames Most popular given names Name at birth Name letter effect Nickname Number names Onomastics Palindromic name such as Anna Bob Eve Hannah Nan and Otto. Patronymic Personal name Personally identifiable information Popular cat names Posthumous name Proper name Regnal name Surname Temple name Unisex name References "Dolphins Name Themselves With Whistles Study Says". National Geographic News. May 8 2006. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/05/060508dolphins.html.  Henry George Liddell Robert Scott A Greek-English Lexicon on Perseus project "Online Etymology Dictionary". http://www.etymonline.com/index.phpsearchname&searchmodenone. Retrieved 2008-09-20. ; The asterisk before a word indicates that it is a hypothetical construction not an attested form. "Egyptian Religion" E.A Wallis Budge" Arkana 1987 edition ISBN 0-14-019017-1 Verisign.com Verisign.com Further reading "Names" by Sam Cumming Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP) a philosophical dissertation on the syntax and semantics of names Matthews Elaine; Hornblower Simon; Fraser Peter Marshall Greek Personal Names: Their Value as Evidence Proceedings of The British Academy (104) Oxford University Press 2000. ISBN 0197262163 Name and Form - from Sacred Texts Buddhism External links Kate Monk's Onomastikon(Dictionary of Names) or Kate Monk's Onomastikon Names over the world throughout the history What is a Name The etymology of first names Meaning of Names The etymology of first names v d ePersonal names in world cultures Akan Arabic Balinese Bangladeshi Belarussian Bulgarian Burmese Cambodian Canadian Catalan Chinese Croatian Czech Dutch Habesha English Fijian Finnish Taiwanese aborigines French Galician German Ghanaian Greek Hawaiian Hebrew Hungarian Icelandic Igbo Indian Indonesian Irish Italian Japanese Javanese Jewish Korean Lao Latvian Lithuanian Malaysian Mongolian Okinawan Pakistani Pashtun Persian Philippine Polish Portuguese Roman Russian Sakha Scottish Gaelic Serbian Sindhi Slovak Spanish (Hispanic America) Tatar Thai Tibetan Turkish Ukrainian Vietnamese Yoruba v d eLogic  Related articles Academic areas Argumentation theory  Axiology  Critical thinking  Computability theory  Formal semantics  History of logic  Informal logic  Logic in computer science  Mathematical logic  Mathematics  Metalogic  Metamathematics  Model theory  Philosophical logic  Philosophy  Philosophy of logic  Philosophy of mathematics  Proof theory  Set theory Foundational concepts Abduction  Analytic truth  Antinomy  A priori  Deduction  Definition  Description  Entailment  Induction  Inference  Logical consequence  Logical form  Logical implication  Logical truth  Name  Necessity  Meaning  Paradox  Possible world  Presupposition  Probability  Reason  Reasoning  Reference  Semantics  Statement  Substitution  Syntax  Truth  Truth value  Validity  Philosophical logic Critical thinking and Informal logic Analysis  Ambiguity  Belief  Credibility  Evidence  Explanation  Explanatory power  Fact  Fallacy  Inquiry  Opinion  Parsimony  Premise  Propaganda  Prudence  Reasoning  Relevance  Rhetoric  Rigor  Vagueness Theories of deduction Constructivism  Dialetheism  Fictionalism  Finitism  Formalism  Intuitionism  Logical atomism  Logicism  Nominalism  Platonic realism  Pragmatism  Realism  Metalogic and Metamathematics Cantor's theorem  Church's theorem  Church's thesis  Consistency  Effective method  Foundations of mathematics  Gdel's completeness theorem  Gdel's incompleteness theorems  Soundness  Completeness  Decidability  Interpretation  LwenheimSkolem theorem  Metatheorem  Satisfiability  Independence  Typetoken distinction  Usemention distinction  Mathematical logic General Formal language  Formation rule  Formal system  Deductive system  Formal proof  Formal semantics  Well-formed formula  Set  Element  Class  Classical logic  Axiom  Natural deduction  Rule of inference  Relation  Theorem  Logical consequence  Axiomatic system  Type theory  Symbol  Syntax  Theory Traditional logic Proposition  Inference  Argument  Validity  Cogency  Syllogism  Square of opposition  Venn diagram Propositional calculus and Boolean logic Boolean functions  Propositional calculus  Propositional formula  Logical connectives  Quantifiers  Truth tables Predicate First-order  Quantifiers  Predicate  Second-order  Monadic predicate calculus Set theory Set  Empty set  Enumeration  Extensionality  Finite set  Function  Subset  Power set  Countable set  Recursive set  Domain  Range  Ordered pair  Uncountable set Model theory Model  Interpretation  Non-standard model  Finite model theory  Truth value  Validity Proof theory Formal proof  Deductive system  Formal system  Theorem  Logical consequence  Rule of inference  Syntax Computability theory Recursion  Recursive set  Recursively enumerable set  Decision problem  ChurchTuring thesis  Computable function  Primitive recursive function  Non-classical logic Modal logic Alethic  Axiologic  Deontic  Doxastic  Epistemic  Temporal Intuitionism Intuitionistic logic  Constructive analysis  Heyting arithmetic  Intuitionistic type theory  Constructive set theory Fuzzy logic Degree of truth  Fuzzy rule  Fuzzy set  Fuzzy finite element  Fuzzy set operations Substructural logic Structural rule  Relevance logic  Linear logic Paraconsistent logic Dialetheism Description logic Ontology   Ontology language  Logicians Anderson  Aristotle  Averroes  Avicenna  Bain  Barwise  Bernays  Boole  Boolos  Cantor  Carnap  Church  Chrysippus  Curry  De Morgan  Frege  Geach  Gentzen  Gdel  Hilbert  Kleene  Kripke  Leibniz  Lwenheim  Peano  Peirce  Putnam  Quine  Russell  Schrder  Scotus  Skolem  Smullyan  Tarski  Turing  Whitehead  William of Ockham  Wittgenstein  Zermelo  Lists Topics Outline of logic  Index of logic articles  Mathematical logic  Boolean algebra  Set theory Other Logicians  Rules of inference  Paradoxes  Fallacies  Logic symbols Portal  Category  Outline  WikiProject  Talk  changes