I’m named after a now-dead uncle who was very much undead when I was born. I have also had a non-relation name their child after me (middle name).
I was honored by the naming after me, and I assume my uncle was as well (by the time I was old enough to know, any discomfort would have blown over, I suppose, but I can’t imagine it).
Unless the family in question has religious reasons, I’d just suggest making up some other weird rules that “everybody knows,” and complaining about them until the complainers get the hint:
“You served me food with a FOUR-tined fork on a Thursday? Jeeze!”
“I can’t believe you put a 60-watt bulb in an OUTDOOR socket!”
“You use the same towels for bathing AND showering?”
It’s the Ukrainian (and maybe Russian, too) tradition to give all children their father’s first name (or diminutive thereof) as a middle name. So Alexander Kruschev’s son Oleg might be Oleg Alexander Kruschev and his daughter Olga would be Olga Alexandra Kruschev. I’ve been told that it’s so strong a practice that if you didn’t give the kids their father’s name in the middle, people would wonder about his/her paternity.
My middle name is my paternal grandmother’s first name, and she was very much alive at the time. My mother claims that it was a complete accident though. She just happened to like how the middle name sounded with the first name (both are very common), and it wasn’t until after the birth certificate was signed that someone pointed out to her that my middle name was my grandmother’s name.
When my mother had a second daughter, of course she was expected to name that daughter after her own mother–who had a very old-fashioned name that everyone (including her mother) hated. She managed to get out of things by using a diminutive instead, and my sister loves its uniqueness.
My first brother was named after my father, as a Jr. My second brother got my maternal grandfather’s name as a middle name.
When I had kids, I vowed not to name them after anyone I knew. I still managed to accidentally give my initials to my daughter. (My husband didn’t bother to point this out to me until I became aware of it as I was signing the social security forms!)
My mother’s Asian family absolutely wouldn’t let my dad name me after him. So he settled for giving me his middle name. I guess that works for me since I don’t know if I wanted to grow up being called Dick Jr.
I worked in the post partum unit last night and was present when the new parents told the grandma that the new baby was named after her. Many happy tears were shed. That was one happy grandma (and a very nice family overall).
My wife is Jewish and both sides of her family followed such a tradition of not naming a child after a living person, but honoring the dead by naming children after them. My Wife’s family is Ukrainian and Russian Jew.
As an example, my wife’s Great Grandmother was Jenny. Among the second cousins there is a Jennifer, Gena and a Guenivere which is old Welsh equivalent of Jennifer.
Of a different tradition, my family is Italian, my brother is John Joseph III, my Uncle is Alfred, named after everybody’s favorite Uncle Al while he was still alive. My BIL is Irish, my Nephew is named after him.
I have seen many kids named after family or friends. I have only seen Jewish people refrain from this.
In the Russian tradition, it’s your patronymic, and it’s not the father’s name but the father’s name with ovich or evich added if you’re a male, and evna or ovna if you’re female.
So Alexander has his son Oleg, who would be
Oleg Alexandrovich and his sister would be Olga Alexandrovna
Alexander’s brother is Nikolai, and Nikolai has two children, Anya and Igor. Their names would be
Anya Nicholaievna and Igor Nicholaievich.
And I believe the traditional custom is to address everyone by their first name and patronymic, just like we would say Mr. Kruschev, so we’d say something like, Alexander Petrovich. (for his father, Peter).
Yeah, that’s it. I married into a Ukrainian family and learned that tradition, and I think it’s kind of cool. Nice way to include the father’s name without having the confusion of which of two "Edward"s a caller wants. The unfortunate part is it seems to leave out Mom in the naming.
We gave both our daughters their father’s name with a feminine ending as a middle name. Fortunately he has a name that is easy to do that with in English. I would never have consented to it if the resulting full name was not pleasant sounding.
I can confirm that - my wife’s Sephardic, and we named our son after her father. Calling it an honor is an understatement. As far as the man is concerned, we can now do no wrong.
Great Great Grandpa was Samuel Lastname
Great grandpa was Samuel Alexander Lastname
Grandpa is Samuel Middlename Lastname
My Father-in-law is Samuel GivenName Lastname
My husband is Samuel Eric (after his other grandfather) DifferentGivenName Lastname
Do you have any idea how difficult it is to use your middle name as a given name? Especially since many forms only have space for one middle name?
My husband has to check if his tickets are booked under his given name or the name on his passports. Some bank accounts and official documents are in his given name, some in his full name, some in a weird combo because of the space on the form.
Apparently our son will be be Samuel Father-in-law’s-Givenname Something Lastname or Samuel Something Father-in-law’s-Givenname Lastname, as my husband has only sisters. Which will also make his life difficult…especially since I want to name any son we might have “Isaac” after my grandfather.
My mother is named after her uncle (Erich became Erica) and I’m named after my grandmother. Since the only other family name that hasn’t been used so far is Rudolf, I think we might be safe from having to name people after others.
In the end, as long as the parents and the person who the baby was named for are happy, what should it matter?
My middle name is the same as BOTH grandmothers’ first names. They were both living when I was born. My brother’s name is Jon (grandfather was John), and my sister’s middle name is the same as my mother’s middle name. There are a lot of people in the extended family who are named (or middle-named) after then-living relatives.
What about the custom of giving children the same name as the parents? e.g. John Sr. and John Jr. - I’ve always had the impression that this is very common indeed in the US, so I was surprised at the OP’s question, unless of course the OP is not US-based.
the key to the original posters puzzle is for him to find out where his and his friends wife heard this theory as as we have established from the answers in this thread there aren’t any widely known traditions that enforce this etiquette. You may find it is a family traditon that has spread to a close circle of friends, or perhaps a regional or tribal tradition fromwherever they come from… of course they could have just come up with the idea themselves
The OP did specify that the people in question consider it Ok to name a child the same name as a relative in direct lineage (e.g. son named the same as the father or grandson named the same as the grandfather.)
That doesn’t shed any light on this so-called rule though. One has to conclude that they got things confused because the rule, as they state it, doesn’t make much sense and is unknown to all of us here.
