CommanderBolt wrote:You have gotta love those crazy Icelandic names eh'.
I'm European and I have met a lot of people from a lot of different countries but I tell you, Icelandic names are in a league of their own for uniqueness.
Their weirdness/uniqueness is actually caused by a few things:
First: We don't allow children to be named "foreign" names, every name needs to have some sort of documented heritage or fit into the conjugation rules of the language. So because we have a "J+¦n", you can't be named "John". Every year, a group of scholars "allow" a few new names through, that abide to those rules. So, Kieran might be added because of some celtic heritage of one guy, that can track his ancestors back many generations. At least 8 Kierans must exist in official birth records, going back as far as possible, meaning all the way back to the earliest clerical documents, as old as 1.200 AD.
Second: We don't have family names. Since we were so few that migrated from the Nordic countries, it became confusing as basically everyone was a "Smith". It became very confusing. Also, we had a lot of viking heroes, that went by their first name, and their "deed name" usually became their "true" last name. Let's say Ragnar Lo+¦br+¦k (his name could have been +ümundason but he killed a dragon, while wading through the dragon's poison in custom triple bear pelt pants, Lo+¦ = Woolly, Br+¦k = pants.)
So, people could not keep up with this, and also, children wanted to be recognized by their hero father, usually. The son of Ragnar Lo+¦br+¦k wouldn't by Karkur Lo+¦br+¦k, he didn't wear those pants, so he becames the next best thing, the son of Ragnar Lo+¦br+¦k or Karkur Ragnarsson.
Long story short, all children have the last name "fathers"+"son", and for daughters "fathers"+"daughter".
So I am Snorri, son of +ürni, i.e. Snorri +ürnason. But because we are also proud of our ancestors, my dad named me Snorri after his dad, so he is +ürni Snorrason, and his dad named him after his dad, so my great grandpa is also Snorri +ürnason, my namesak, which we call a "full namesake". So my extended family/kin can also recognize the connection quickly when they hear that particular name.
Hope everyone learned something today!