i know quite a few leroys.
Then there’s my unfavorite uncle who gave his kid the middle name of “Von,” making him “So-and-So Von Germanic Surname.” Can’t get much tackier than that, I’m afraid.
I think it was Joan Rivers (back when she was funny) that did a bit on how ugly the English Royal family was.
IIRC the bit went:
They are all dogs, if you don’t believe me go outside and yell Queenie, Duke, and Prince and see what shows up.
Already used. That’s where I lived in college.
In terms of aristocratic names I don’t know if anything beats Urhines Kendall Icy Eight Special K (presumably Urhines = Your Highness).
Knew a guy whose first name was “Doctor”.
There was also a former Miss Black America, Von Gretchen Shepard. She went on to become a member of the Peter Jacques Band.
Why do Americans have arisocratic names? because we can.
It goes all the way back to the begining with a revolution against a monarchy. The government serves us, not the other way around. It’s an independence thing. Nobody around to tell us where our place is in society.
Then there was Garrison Keillor’s putative uncle who was named Senator because his mother thought it sounded grand
I personally know two Kings–one born in the 1940s, one in the 1960s, both black
Quite a few Earls–various ages up to 80s, all white
Several Leroys (or LeRoi), who tend to be in their 40s and 50s and married to nurses, mostly white, one Hispanic
My family has two Reginas–do they count? I also went to school with one.
And finally, one Prince (not the rock star). He was a childhood friend of my mother, aunts & uncles, my mother’s high-school sweetheart, and my father’s college roommate. (Yeah, you can see the progression here. No hard feelings. He was best man at their wedding.)
But then there is Sacha Baron Cohen–isn’t he English? What’s up with that? (No, I’m not claiming to know him.)
And my all-time favorite over-the-top name: Rose Mary Echo Silver Dollar Tabor. No royalty there, it’s just my favorite over-the-top name.
Jane Fonda’s given name is Lady Jayne Fonda. There is another name in there after Jayne, but I’ve forgotten it.
I had twins in my classroom named Prince and Princess.
Hey, let’s not forget Caesar Romero! If he wasn’t born in America, he came to live here.
For what it’s worth, I was once told that some black parents named their daughters Princess Anne, Queen Mary, etc., etc., in order to more or less force white people to address them with some degree of respect. I was told this back in the early 1950s when it was still considered okay to denigrate blacks in any way possible, at least where I grew up. YMMV.
I readily admit that it is entirely possible my chain was being yanked.
Apparently not. Prince’s real name is Prince Rogers Nelson.
OTOH, Chyna (sp?) Kantner would have been named “god” if her parents (Paul Kantner and Grace Slick) had not been forbidden the option.
Going back to the sub-topic of Don Trump’s kid Barron, one of the earlier famous “Barrons” in the US was Barron Hilton, the guy who started the hotel compnay & made it real big about 50-75 years ago.
Given that Trump is also at least a little in the hotel & corporate empire building business, the connection seems obvious.
Caesar was originally just a name then it became a title.
My son goes to school with a boy called “Sir William” as a given name. Odd names are par for the course here in the Dominican Republic. There are lots of girls called “Leidy”, “Mileidy” and “Leididí” (derived from Lady, My Lady and Lady Di) here and in other Latin American countries too.
Maybe he is naming the kid after Barron Hilton.
His full last name is Baron Cohen - he has, I am given to understand, a cousin who’s a moderately famous psychologist, who hyphenates it to avoid confusion. So it doesn’t entirely fit the topic at hand.
Even aside from the non-given name part, the ‘Baron’ is apparently a variant on Baruch. (I wonder how many people with the given name Baron gained it through such a path.)
There must be something to that. I know at least two Barons who are Jewish.