Names: Ugly Heads and Grateful Deads

The other day I posted about how people aren't being original. And you know, yesterday I learned (in class) that I was right.

First, a brief history lesson. Did you know that last names arose out of necessity? For instance, if you had two Bills in town, and one was a blacksmith and the other a shoe maker, you had to distinguish them somehow, and now you have Bill Smith and Bill Shoemaker. Physical features were used as well, so if you were talking about John, the ugly one, you would say John Kennedy (which means John "ugly head"). Then there are patronymics, and you get names like Jackson, Stevenson, Fitzgerald, or Fitzpatrick (all meaning "son of so-and-so"). I found all of this stuff pretty interesting. However, my favorite point was this one:

Apparently the
Welsh need the sixties, or some
Creative movement

Did you know that 95% of the Welsh population answers to 39 names. So pretty much you'll have a lot of Jacks, Rubys, Megans, and Bruces (that last one was a Monty Python reference). Some creativity wouldn't hurt. Maybe we could send a few of the left-over hippies over there to populate the region with some Hopes, Rainbows, Destinies, or Prudences. Wouldn't be too hard, just put on a Grateful Dead concert there.

In other news, Hilary used to be a boys name. Hillary Clinton is bringing that back.