Gotta hand it to parents and the thrill of naming an addition to the species, especially so in revolutionary times. So it was after the Russian Revolution. Apart from the obligatory rush of kids called Marks, Engelina, Stalina, Ninel (Lenin backwards) and Melor (Marx, Engels, Lenin, October Revolution), the more creative include:
Barrikada, Parizhkommuna, Dinamit, Ateist, Avangarda, Tekstil, Industriya, Dinamo, Monblan (Mont Blanc), Singapur (?).
However, my favourites are: Traktorina, Elektrifikatsiya and Giotin. Hate to meet the adult version of the last guy on the wrong side of the tracks … with a name like ‘Guillotine’.
1 February, 2012 at 4:10 am
My wife is due in May. I am going to push to name our son Marks. I don’t think Melor would have a shot.
1 February, 2012 at 12:41 pm
Let us know how it goes. Marks is not bad actually. Given that Chinese doesn’t have syllables that end in consonants (n and ng sound more like vowels), they have Maenlestama – Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin, Mao!
2 February, 2012 at 6:26 am
I have studied just enough chinese to think that is bullshit. What are the tones on that name? And my wife refuses to name our son Marks. She laughed when I said Marx was brilliant. Thinking about finding a lawyer…
2 February, 2012 at 6:58 am
Tones are beyond me, but I was told this in all seriousness in China. However, I don’t think it applies to children’s names, but to a beautiful paper-cut with the five heroes. You might want to dip into Mongolian names during the communist era: Oktyabar, Seseer (USSR) or Melschoi – the first four letter you can guess, the ‘choi’ is for Choibalsan.
2 February, 2012 at 8:35 am
Marks is my mother’s surname.
3 February, 2012 at 12:37 pm
What excellent revolutionary credentials! My grandfather was made a knight (ridder) of the order of Oranje Nassau. Then again, that puts me in Lenin’s shoes: an offspring of one who was knighted for service to the country. Not hereditary, damn it.
2 February, 2012 at 2:15 am
Would a child called “Stalina” have suffered disadvantage after the Khrushchevite revisionist turn? Would not the mere presence of this reminder of the Man of Steel serve as witness to the objective fact that Khrushchevite treachery is structurally incapable of advancing the revolution (as I believe industrial output figures from this period will attest to)?
2 February, 2012 at 6:58 am
Stalina is kind of sexy, don’t you think?
2 February, 2012 at 8:27 am
The parents of the Russian tennis player Marat Safin named him after the French revolutionary, so 1789 is also an inspiration for Russian parents seeking names for their off-spring.
3 February, 2012 at 12:35 pm
Beats naming them after some inbred monarch.
3 February, 2012 at 2:00 am
Here’s a few more actual Revolutionary Baby Names in Russia:
Dinamit (Dynamite)
Engelina
Zikatra (“Zinoviev, Kamenev, Trotsky”)
Robesper
Melor (“Marx, Engels, Lenin, October Revolution”)
And one of my favorites: Traktor; Traktorina (tractor)
3 February, 2012 at 12:15 pm
Are you implying that the ones I listed, including Melor and Traktorina, are not ‘actual’?