How is this about Western culture in any meaningful way? Most of the names mentioned in the OP are exclusively anglophone names. And not even full names at that, a lot of them are abbreviations for longer names that have clear male/female varieties.
I don’t really see the point of this exercise but I think I’d say two things in contribution
tons of languages have clearly delineated masculine and feminine names identified by a suffix. Take the French language, where there are tons of pairs (Francois, Francoise; Jean, Jeanne). The same is true even more so in Slavic languages where it is virtually impossible for any name to be both male and female, since those languages have hard and fast rules about which nouns are masculine and which are feminine. Hence Jan/Jana; Petr/Petra, in Czech, for instance. It is true that it’s possible to create abbreviations that look feminine (like Honza for Jan, Vanja for Ivan, or Sasha for Aleksander - but while they might look grammatically feminine they’re still not women’s names in Slavic languages, nor are they actually given names for any men, they’re just abbreviations. There are also examples of female forms are often diminutives of masculine names (eg Bauke, Baukje, in Frisian). With these identifying suffixes, there’s no room for ambiguity like there is in English.
as for English, I don’t think any name ‘started out’ gender neutral. I think they all started out gender-specific but through abbreviation, language diffusion over a large area, and maybe a bunch of cultural factors, they might have become more ambiguous. Still, I think the OPs ‘names that were once gender neutral but have probably crossed over’ gets the direction wrong.
Do I have to say this for the third or fourth time now? Nothing in the OP limited this discussion to the names mentioned as examples in the OP.
In context – meaning in the context that names are used in every day life – it doesn’t matter whether a name is a “full name” or an abbreviation. If someone mentions someone by name to you, do you necessarily expect them to always give you the full, formal name?
It’s not an exercise. It’s asking for people’s personal opinions.
Then don’t offer any French or Slavic names as examples. If I were to ask you “What are the largest deserts in the Western world?” would you reply with “This is obviously a North and South America-centric question, because Europe has only small deserts.”?
I didn’t set out a comprehensive history of English names. I asked for the current impressions of names as they are currently used. From this particular point in time. I didn’t “get the direction wrong.” I merely picked an arbitrary point in time (i.e., now), and indicated the most recent shift in direction.
Your OP suggests that you are making some unexplored and IMHO unjustified assumptions, which I’m pointing out. If you can’t handle that, don’t make those assumptions, or don’t post about them. Or both.
You’re the one making unjustified assumptions by trying to look behind what was a very simple and straightforward question. If you don’t like the topic or have nothing to contribute then you’re welcome not to post in it. Of I had wanted to form a discussion on the entire history of gender identification and given names I could have done that, and I probably have at some point. All you are doing is threadshitting.
Sounds about par for the course. Back in Indiana, I worked with a married couple both named Tracy. My niece’s inlaws are Chris and Terry. It becomes humorous when they get telemarketers or junk mail.
When I hear “Ariel”, my first two associations are the Little Mermaid (who’s female) and Prospero’s servant (who I think is male, but I’m not certain e has a well-defined gender).