Iron Age Common Names: ideas for next UrW Character

[ineedcords]

I was looking for traditional names and found this resource linked below. The web page from 2013 & looks like one that can disappear any time so I did a full quote below, just in case.

I am neither Finnish, nor have any knowledge on the matter so any input from knowledgeable people whether this list makes sense would be appreciated.
Any additions welcome, please post below.




EDIT: See post Plotinus' reply below for list of names supplied by the game split into 3 cultural region files and subcategorised by gender. This post below has the filenames: https://www.unrealworld.fi/forums/index.php?topic=6479.msg19224#msg19224

Baby Names (Iron Age: Common Names)

These are some of the more common names used in Scandinavia during the Iron Age. Only a few of these are regularly used today.

Female Names
Alfdis, Arnora, Asa, Asgerd, Asleif, Asta, Astrid, Aud, Bera, Bergljot, Bergthora, Dotta, Freydis, Gjaflaug, Grima, Grimhild, Groa, Gudrid, Gudrun, Gunnhild, Gyda, Halldis, Hallfrid, Hallgerd, Hallveig, Helga, Herdis, Hild, Hildigunn, Hlif, Hrefna, Hrodny, Ingibjorg, Ingigerd, Ingirid, Ingunn, Jorunn, Katla, Ragna, Ragnhild, Rannveig, Saeunn, Sigrid, Svala, Thjodhild, Thora, Thorsbjorg, Thordis, Thorfinna, Thorgerd, Thorgunna, Thorhalla, Thorhild, Thorkatla, Thorunn, Thurid, Thyra, Unn, Valgerd, Vigdis.

Male Names
Aki, Alf, Alfgeir, Amundi, Ari, Armond, Arnfinn, Arnlaug, Arnor, Aslak, Bardi, Bergthor, Bersi, Bjarni, Bjorn, Bodvar, Bork, Botolf, Brand, Bui, Egil, Einar, Eindridi, Eirik, Eldgrim, Erlend, Eyjolf, Eystein, Eyvind, Finn, Finnbogi, Fridgeir, Gardi, Geir, Geirmund, Geirstein, Gest, Gizur, Glum, Grani, Grim, Gudmund, Gunnar, Gunnbjorn, Gunnlaug, Hafgrim, Hakon, Halfdan, Hall, Halldor, Hallfred, Harald, Harek, Hastein, Hauk, Havard, Hedin, Helgi, Herjolf, Hjalti, Hogni, Hord, Hrafn, Hring, Hroald, Hrut, Illugi, Ingi, Ingjald, Ingolf, Isleif, Ivar, Kalf, Kari, Karlsefni, Ketil, Knut, Kol, Kolbein, Lambi, Leif, Ljot, Ljotolf, Lodin, Mord, Odd, Ofeig, Ogmund, Olaf, Olvir, Onund, Orm, Otkel, Otrygg, Ottar, Ozur, Ragnar, Rognvald, Runolf, Sam, Sighvat, Sigmund, Sigtrygg, Sigulf, Sigurd, Sigwulf, Skapti, Snorri, Solmund, Solvi, Starkad, Stein, Steinkel, Steinthor, Sturla, Styrkar, Sumarlidi.

source: https://listography.com/bowielesya/baby_names/iron_age__common_names
retrieved: July 3 2021

[PALU]

Those are Scandinavian names (as listed), not Finnish ones, and so may only apply to a very limited extent to Islander characters. Note that the Finnish cultural roots have very little in common with the Scandinavian ones, with Scandinavia being dominated by Indo-European migration, while Finland was (re)populated by Uralic peoples using Finnish-Ugric languages.

A problem with many of the names UrW gives to people is that they look, on the surface, as they're local variations of Christian names, which shouldn't have reached Finland at that time. Note that I'm neither Finnish nor knowledgeable about Finnish, so there may well have been preexisting local names that happen to look similar to Christian ones.

[Saukko]

Like PALU noted, those are germanic names - pre-Christian Finnish/Finnic names stem from a different cultural background, and very little is actually known about them - there are some early written sources from Novgorod, which apparently had substantial Fenno-Ugric population and had frequent dealings with at least some Finnic tribes (mostly Karelians, Izhorians (Ingrians), and Votes (Votians) - the Finnic tribes settled around the easern shores of the Gulf of Finland). Take a look at this page https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suomen_muinaisnimet for some more likely names; it's in Finnish, but you should be able to make sense of it using Google Translate.

Some names and their meanings from the list on that page: Koira (dog), Susi (wolf), Osma (wolverine in ancient Finnish, modern "Ahma", ), Otava (the constellation Big Dipper, or a type of fishing net from which the constelallation gets its name), Joutti (from "joutsi", a bow). Western tribes might have had some Scandinavian/Germanic influenced names due to dealings with foreign traders/raiders - pretty much the same thing in those days - but with a localized twist, for example "Wilhelm" would turn into "Viljo", while eastern tribes might have names more related to nature.

[Plotinus]

You can also find names in the .DAT files in the urw folder, there are six files, sorted by gender and region (north, east, west).

[ineedcords]

Thank you for the responses!

You can also find names in the .DAT files in the urw folder, there are six files, sorted by gender and region (north, east, west).

I knew these files and used them for lookup but completely forgot about them - thanks for the pointer! I have updated the OP to point to this post instead.

For anyone interested these below are the exact filenames:

eastf.dat/eastm.dat
westf.dat/westm.dat
northf.dat/northm.dat