Onomatology and Made-up Names (part A )

Onomatology or Onomastics,Anthroponomastics,Toponomastics,hypocoristics,diminutive names,nicknames which in the future turned into Surnames (Second Names),bynames and ancestral namesakes that scholars aim to study and explain the origin and the history of countless names all over the world. A very good example is “The American Name Society” founded in 1951 that promotes Onomastics by investigating cultural insights,history and linguistic traits behind the names. Also “The English Place-Name Society” concerned with Toponomastics,the study of Toponyms.

Onomatology is a very interesting part of languages and when  taught in schools students build up knowledge in a very pleasant way by exploring History,Mythology,Geography,Religions,their cultural and social background and many other sources of interest.

Have you ever thought of what your name could reveal? Imagine your name was  Sophia,Rebecca,Plato,Eleni,or Paris , every name a page or pages in Mythology , History , Religions.

Here is the story of my Made-up short name,a CACOPHONOUS name with funny surprises and coincidences.

As my real first name is a mouthful of a name when I was a toddler and people asked what my name was,the only thing I could articulate to ” facilitate ” my communication needs was DO- DA  ( how odd,my real name has no Ds). A very funny short name that I had decided to keep for ever ( who knows why) despite my parents efforts to make me use my real name.There was no response and having no other choice they started making use of it and so did all our social environment and relatives. However, some of them  didn’t like it for different reasons but they never convinced me to change it.For instance , an English friend of mine ,June, had labelled it as an intense ALLITERATION example because of the D-D consonant (sorry June very pedantic I am afraid) don’t you know   ALLITERATION is accepted in most languages especially in poetry? Some other friends found it ill-sounding,harsh sounding,immusical,cacophonous and that it sounded like a PISTOL SHOT.Oh my God !!!  what else am I going to hear about my innocent Made-up name? I used to say  I liked it and that it was unique……that’s what I  thought then. My story goes on with the surprises and coincidences behind my Made-up name  ” DODA” and will follow on my  next post ( part  B )….

      NB : Even the proofread (check-spell) doesn’t like it and  suggests  Dora , Dona…..

Aristotle,Patroclos,Grace,Phedias,Socrates,Lydia,Erato, Sappho,,Constantine,Iphigenia,Adonis,Thalea,Aris……. ???

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