Here I am once again with a pile of Dutch passports on my desk, and I am struck by the predominance in some European countries (particularly the Netherlands and among Belgians of apparently Flemish origin) of people with three given names. Why is this practice more common in Dutch/Flemish-speaking areas, or is that just my perception? Is it a religious custom, or a cultural one? If religious, of what religion, why, and why doesn’t it apparently happen to the same extent in other places where said religion is practiced? If cultural, are the names generally passed down in the family, or do they have any other particular significance?
I’ll give you what I’ve heard when the topic turns up in occasional conversation, but bear in mind that the question was never explored thorougly and I’ve never bothered to look it up. A quick Google didn’t help.
From what I’ve heard, combined with personal experience, it’s mostly a Catholic thing. For some reason one of these three often is Marie (Mary), even with boys. Example: Rudolphus Franciscus Marie Lubbers.
I also got the impression that, besides religion, it is more common with ‘upper class’ families, the kind that for centuries have provided professors and politicians.
Protestants and non-Christians are more likely to have only one ‘given name’ (= ‘christian name’?). However, these days there are no clear and strict divisions. Many parents who are not (believing) Catholic or of lowly origin may adhere to this convention for other reasons, such as tradition (because their parents did it. It also looks fancy, for us Dutch anyway. Or is that just me?
Another motivating factor is that grandparents seem to like having grandchildren named after them. With three names you can satisfy both sets of grandparents.
On occasion you may see people with more than three given names. Those, I think, ‘hebben de klok horen luiden maar weten niet waar de klepel hangt’ (have heard the bell ring, but don’t know where to find the clapper). You can overdo it, you know, Willem-Alexander Claus George Ferdinand!
It’s fairly common in Ireland.
To turn this around, I’ve often been asked a similar question by Norwegians concerning why Americans always seem to have two given names, one of which they rarely use. Norwegians tend to have just one given name. If they have two, like my brother-in-law Hans Kristian, they tend to use both most of the time. My answer is simple but not very satisfying: Tradition.
This, I think, is an important part of it. Dutch children (especially in the catholic south) used to be named after a Saint and one of their ancestors. Which ancestor depended on your birthrank. The oldest son was named after the father’s father, the oldest daughter after the father’s mother. The second son and daugther get their names from the mother’s parents.
Now, in my experience, the later names are mostly of other family members (godfathers and mothers for example).
A curiosity I stumbled upon while googling this: when a child dies, the next one is named after it.
Martijn
In Sweden it is fairly common to have more than one given name. Most people I know have at least two and quite a few have three.
Sweden is a mainly Protestant country (although we are quite secularised). There is no special tradition of having one of the names be that of a Saint or anything. I suspect that naming after relatives is quite common or maybe the parents couldn’t decide on just one name they liked.
Well, I can really only speak for my subculture (American largely secular Reform Jewish), but my first name is after one of my great-grandmothers. (Jewish tradition is to name children after a dead relative; it’s extremely rare to see a Jewish child with the same name as a living relative.) My middle name is just one that my parents both liked and agreed on, although it’s an Old Testament name as well. My younger sister, however, has first and middle names that as far as I know aren’t related to anything in particular; I guess Mom decided to stop being ethnic after I was born or something.
In the U.S., it’s common to name children after relatives. (Biblical names are classics, of course, although I never met anyone named Lot or Methuseleh.) Sometimes if there is a family name to be carried on, such as the mother’s maiden name or the name of a favorite uncle, but it’s a name that would be unusual for a first name, it’s carried on in the form of a middle name. That way the poor kid doesn’t get teased to death in school.
And sometimes parents just latch onto a name they like; I had a classmate in college who was ethnic Japanese from Hawaii, and she was named Lara, but with a long Japanese last name. Apparently her mom was watching Dr. Zhivago while she was pregnant and developed a crush on Omar Sharif. (I can’t say that I blame her!)
I have three given names, my first name is a very common name, my first middle name is my Grandfather’s first name and my second middle name is a family name (it’s actually an ancestor’s of mine’s maiden name, and it’s been traditional for the last 200 years for male members of our family to have this).
In the UK having three middle names, though not the norm, is quite common especially among the upper/ upper middle classes (not that I would say I’m upper/upper middle class but my family are) and quite often one of them is a traditional family middle name.
I studied a semester in Belgium and I asked a guy why he had a girl’s name as second name. He told me that everyone takes their godfathers and godmothers names and one of “their own”. I don’t know if it’s catholic or cultural. I’m sure a dutch-speaking person willl come along shortly and explain better.
Juggler, for the record, both Goodbeem and me are Dutch. 
En waar is Coldfire eigenlijk
MC, it’s not a class thing in the UK, at least IME. I used to sort out the computers of the county Registrar of Births, Deaths, and Marriages, and saw some odd names. Acronyms and verbal puns were not uncommon - and quite deliberate. I’m not going to cite specifics because (a) I have deliberately forgotten the details and (b) it would be a breach of confidentiality anyway. I will cite my nephew whose first name was based on the whim of his mother, whose second name was the name of both grandfathers, and whose third name was chosen simply because it sounded cool.
With regard to the religous angle, a Catholic friend of mine told me that when going through confirmation, it was customary to take an additional name (I suppose you could call that a “taken”, rather than a “given” name).
Do Protestants that grow up in religious families also do that when they get confirmed?
in Ireland it’s usually a traditional thing. Putting the names of relatives in as second and third names as a way of paying tribute to them.
I know you’re an Immigration Paralegal; do we get a lot of Dutch immigrants? I’m just curious.
I suppose it’s just a case of the grass being greener, but I thought The Netherlands such a beautiful place when I was there I would want go live there.
true, but you wouldn’t put that on official documents such as a passport.
A few, but not too many. Most of what my office does is employment-based, so I see the people working for multinationals who are coming for a temporary U.S. assignment (which sometimes ends up being permanent), or R&D people who have just finished a Ph.D. in a field where the U.S. is at the forefront, so they want to do their research here.
[further hijack]
I think the Dutch win the prize, though, in terms of proportion of people to whom I have to explain that just because you’ve been living with someone for 10 years and have kids together, the U.S. government won’t recognize her as your wife for permanent immigration purposes unless you actually go and get the official piece of paper. One guy, on the questionnaire blank for “spouse” crossed it out and wrote “non-spouse.”
It seems to be fairly common in France as well, for the same reasons that Tusculan mentioned. I’ve got two first names (well, one first name made up of two hyphenated names) and one middle name, my father has one first name and three middle names, and my uncle has two of each.
And Z is from Belgium. I have only 2 given names: my firstname and my godfathers first name.