Religious names used to be popular as girls’ names in Ireland, Concepta, Dolores etc.
Nowadays names that celebrities call their kids or were popular white trashy names in the US a few years back seem to be very popular.
You must have known my parents; I’m Elizabeth (first name) and my brother is Alexander. However, he’s always been called Sandy and I’ve always been called by my middle name, Jane.
I do heartily agree that a nice, longer name that has many variants is a good practical child’s name.
And I like the new babies with “old-fashioned” names. I’d rather see a revival of Mabel and Pearl and Hazel than the made-up names that are so common (and mockable). Down with “Mykenzee” now!
It’s actor John Wayne’s real given name. Having only known female Marions in my life, I find that somewhat amusing. Whatever you may think of him as an actor, or his conservative politics, he sure didn’t look like a Marion.
I didn’t know “Helmut” was particularly old fashioned. I’m pretty sure I knew one or two Helmuts when I was over there, and they were young students.
This is the situation in Finland, too. Names from my parents’ generation, like Risto, Raili, Ulla, Erkki, or Hannele are really uncommon as first names for kids, while older names which were en vogue during the first part of the 1900’s are really making a comeback, especially with girls. Lots and lots of little Helmis, Emmas, Almas, Hetas and Siiris running around.
Not my culture, and they don’t really have a country, but I worked with 2 Hmong people named Elvis, both born in the 80’s. And, I knew a lot of Hmong Beatrices’, an Ethel, etc. I don’t know if these names were birth names or names given after emigration.
My real name is very old-fashioned. To the point were some people have asked me if it’s a real Indian name.
Examples in Indian culture would be names like Snigdha, Ekalavya, Dattatreya, Dhananjay, Kashinath, Sadashiv etc. There are still people named that but I don’t hear them for little kids anymore. Incidentally, one of the foregoing is my middle name. OMG!
With reference to the OP, Helmut would not stick out like a sore thumb today -the name just isn’t in fashion. The sartorial equivalent of Helmut would be a nondescript item of clothing that’s never been in fashion this last century, but also could always be worn this last century without causing comment.
One old-fashioned first name that really sticks out is Hasso (example: Hasso Plattner, SAP AG cofunder) because nowadays Hasso is a popular dog name.
I have no particular examples of old-fashioned Chinese names (not really having a good sense of that as one who was born and raised in the US), but when I asked my parents to pick Chinese names for my kids, my Mom made a LOT of fun of the names my Dad suggested as “peasanty” or “rural” (tu).
I was told that really, really “traditional” (superstitious) names for girls in a family with only girl children so far (my first two kids were girls) would include references to how the next child could or should be a boy (e.g., jiao* di*, or “calling for a younger brother”). My Dad never suggested anything like that, but when my third child was in fact a boy, he wanted to name him something absurdly flashy (xun fa, or “easy prosperity”), which apparently is pretty ridiculous by modern standards. He objected that the really superstitious tradition would dictate giving the firstborn son a highly negative name, like “Stupid Ugly”, so that evil demons might not notice our good fortune and strike him down in envy. Fortunately for me (even my own name, I suppose), my Mom had the final word and they got pretty normal sounding names (although I am not, as I already said, in a position to judge very well).
One more thing about “traditional” Chinese names: given names typically have two words/characters in them, and in my Dad’s family each generation has the same first root word (e.g., my father is yen wei, his brother is yen zhong, his other brothers would all be yen-something). There is or was a clan book listing all the root names for many generations (past and future) but it was lost during WW2 and the subsequent Communist takeover. I believe most such books were lost during the Cultural Revolution so this is an irrevocably lost tradition.
My mother was Vancine. I am Georgina; my father is George. I’ve always believed deep in my heart that they wanted a boy first. My cousin is Georgia, after my father, my sister is Terisa ta-rissa. I had a daughter with the middle name Ailsa. Pronounced like it looks – ail-sah. My sister Terisa’s daughter is Seana (pronounced shay-na) and I have a cousin with a son named Nathale nah-tally and a daughter named Phoenix. My own daughter is Enya after the singer. I wanted to spell it Eithne, which is the correct Gaelic spelling, but her father said no way. Had friends with a son named Akoni Chinaysu. Apparently Swahili for ‘it is my turn’ and another friend with twin boys named Andre Entoine and Endre Antoine. Names are awesome. 