Falla

Meaning: (Torch, Bonfire, Resembling a Crow, This name, with variant spelling Fala, is of Scottish territorial origin from the lands of Fala in Midlothian. The name is believed to derive from the Medieval English "Falwe", (ultimately from the Olde English pre 7th Century "Falh"), meaning "Fallow" i.e. a piece of ploughed ground left uncropped for a year or more. The surname from this source was first recorded in the latter part of the 12th Century (see below). One, Bartholomew de Faulaw was witness to a charter in favour of the House of Soltre between the years 1214 -1240. One, George de Falow was Provost of Edinburgh in 1421. The variant spellings Fallawe, Fawlo, Faulo and Falowe appear on record in Scotland during the period 1426 - 1453. James Fala was a tenant under the Abbey of Kelso in 1576. On June 24th, 1723 William Falla and Janet Veitch were married in Edinburgh, Midlothian. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Radulf Falache, charter witness, which was dated circa 1165 - "The Register of Paisley Monastery", during the reign of King William, "The Lion of Scotland", 1166 - 1214. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. In England this was known as Poll Tax. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling. http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Falla)

Origin: (Spanish, Catalan, Scottish, Old English, Native American)

Pronunciation: (FAElah)

Gender: Uni-Sex

I read this name in the 2014 Year Book of Jehovah’s Witnesses. I think a man in the Philippines was named this. I think the name and meanings are nice. I don’t really see this name very often but I wouldn’t mind seeing it. I don’t think it is name that would work on too many character but given the right author it could be used well.

Trixie

Meaning: (Bringer of Joy, Brings Joy, Happy, Voyager through Life, She Who Blesses, Short form of Beatrix, from Beatrice (Latin) "voyager (through life); blessed".)

Origin: (Latin, English)

Pronunciation: (TRIK-see, TRIKS-ee)

Gender: Female

I am intending to name a character this in a future novel. The character real name is going to be Beatrix which is a form of Beatrice *see on list of posts*. I think this was Speed Racers girlfriends name and where I think I first kind of came to like it. I don’t think this name would be for everyone and every character but I think it is cute. I think too it works better as a nickname rather than a real name.

Este

Meaning: (From the East, Star, Diminutive form of the name Estelle or Esther.)

Origin: (French, Old Swedish)

Pronunciation: (es-tay)

Gender: Female

There is a band I listened to a few months ago on TV and one of the names of the three sisters in the band is named Este. I think it is unique and quite cool looking. It is a diminutive of Esther *see on list of posts*. It has decent meanings and it is a short name that most people will know how to pronounce because of Estee Lauder cosmetics.

Mavis

Meaning: (Songbud, Song Thrush, The name was first used in English by Geoffrey Chaucer (14th century), author of "The Canterbury Tales".)

Origin: (Celtic, English, Old French)

Pronunciation: (MAY-viss, MAY-vis)

Gender: Uni-Sex

I have used this name, spelled Maviis, as the name of a Galaxy filled with beautiful humanoid creatures in my current novel I am writing. It is a beautiful name with very beautiful meanings and a beautiful look. The history of use is quite extensive so this could be used in many different eras. It has an over all good look and I would love to see this more often.

Melina

Meaning: (Honey, Quince Yellow, Yellow as a Canary,"Mel" can be derived from names such as Melanie meaning "black, dark" or Melissa meaning "honey-bee". Feminine form of the Greek Melinos (quince-yellow), which is from Melon (quince, apple), Mostly 18th century use.)

Origin: (Greek)

Pronunciation: (meh-LEE-nə, ma-LEEN-ah.)

Gender: Female

I was watching I think a show on TV and there was a person named this. It has a pretty unique look. The meanings are lovely and it is a nice alternative to the more popular Melissa. It has a pretty long history of use and it is very rare but I think that carries charm. I did hear it is popular in Italy, Greece and Iran so maybe it is just rare sounding to English speakers. I really like this a lot. It has a luxurious and exotic flair to it.

Caliana

Meaning: (Castle, a Moorish princess for whom a splendid palace was built in Spain. Combination of Callie and Ana. Calianna is a province in Italy.)

Origin: (Arabic, American)

Pronunciation: (cal-E-ah-na, K AH-L-EH-AW N-AH, K-AH-LEE-AW-N-EH)

Gender: Female

I forget where I first saw this but I have used Callie before as a character name. This would be a great lengthened version as would Calandra *see on list of posts*. I have used Calandra nicknamed Callie but Caliana is really pretty and would work really well with Callie nickname. The meanings are lovely and it is just a very beautiful feminine name that I would love to read more about.

Dayana / Daeana / Daeyana

Meaning: (A Bird of Prey, Light, Deity, The Judge, Heavenly, Devine, Valley, Church Leader, and is a variant of Deanna (Old English): place name and occupational name. Derived from the Latin Diviana, which is from Divus (Devine). The name is borne in Roman Mythology by the virgin Goddess of the Moon and of Hunting.)

Origin: (Old English, Latin, Hebrew, Roman Mythology, Indo-European)

Pronunciation: (diy-A-nə, D-ahYaa-Naa)

Gender: Female

I think I saw this as a name for an orchid. I love it so much I added it to my Favorite Female Names list on this blog. The meanings are beautiful. I should mention I added the spelling Daeana and Daeyana, the former looks like Diana and the latter looks like my character names Daey. I thought these spellings made it even more unique. They also look like a name you might hear in Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings or something.

Aston

Meaning: ("East Town; Ash Tree Settlement", Noble Stone, Place name. Also possibly related to a Middle English personal name Astanus. From the name Athelstan. Famous for an English sports car, the Aston Martin.

Recorded as de Aston, Aston, and the dilalectal Haston, this is an English medieval surname. It has three possible origins. The first is locational from the various places called Aston so called from the pre 7th Century words "East", and "tun", or the settlement to the east of a main village, or in some cases the settlement by the ash trees. Locational names were originally given as a means of identification to those who left their village or place of origin to settle elsewhere.

Secondly, the surname may be from some Anglo-Saxon personal name, such as "Aethelstan", composed of "aethel", meaning noble, and "stan", a stone. Asthone de Sancto Luca is noted in the Documents relating to the Danelaw in Lincolnshire in 1140, and Thomas filius Adestan is listed in the Pipe Rolls of Yorkshire in 1187.

Thirdly the surname may be topographical for someone who lived by a conspicuous stone, from stan", fused with f the preposition "at". As an example William Astone appears in the calendar of the White and Black Books of the Cinque Ports in the year 1500. Other recordings include Richard Aston christened at St. John's Hackney, on November 8th 1568, and Daniel Haston christened at St James Clerkenwell, on June 5th 1720. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Richard de Aston. This was dated 1206 in the Curia Regis Rolls of Gloucestershire, during the reign of King John, known as "Lackland", 1199 - 1216. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. In England this was known as Poll Tax. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling. http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Aston)

Origin: (Old English)

Pronunciation: (AS-tən, as-ton, au-ston)

Gender: Uni-Sex

A friend of mine’s husband’s nephew actually has this name. I always thought of it solely as the name of the Aston Martin car. I like the meanings and the history of this name. It has a nice long history more as a surname than a given name but either way it has a good long history so it could be used in different eras. It has a preppy look but also a handsome look. It could fit in a person or characters whole life, from childhood to adulthood, so it seems a name that could age well. I like it and would like to see it more but I don’t get the main character vibe when I see this name. I would prefer it as the name of a secondary character.

Marusya

Meaning: (Bitter, Sea of Bitterness, Rebelliousness, Wished for Child, To Swell, Tart, Beloved of Amun, Pregnant)

Origin: (Russian, Hebrew, Egyptian, French)

Pronunciation: (Maa-R-UW-SYaa)

Gender: Female

I was reading either the 2013 or 2014 Yearbook of Jehovah’s Witnesses and I saw this name. The meanings are diverse and interesting. I rather love the look of this name. It has a unique look but looks like Mary which has many of the same meanings. It is a really pretty name. I would love to see this name more often.

Ophir

Meaning: (Gold, A descendant of Shem through Arpachshad, Shelah, Eber, and Joktan; the 11th of Joktan’s 13 sons. (Ge 10:22-29; 1Ch 1:17-23) Ophir was probably born about 200 years before Abraham, who was a descendant of his paternal uncle Peleg. (Ge 10:25; 11:18-26) As in the case of his brothers, it appears that Ophir also headed one of the Semite tribes that were numbered among the descendants of Noah “according to their families, according to their tongues, in their lands, according to their nations.” (Ge 10:31, 32) See No. 2 for possible locations of the land of Ophir in which this tribe eventually settled.

2. A place renowned as a source of much gold of the finest quality. Thus already in Job’s time (c. 1600 B.C.E.) “precious ore in the dust” and “pure gold” were spoken of in parallel with the “gold of Ophir.” (Job 22:24; 28:15, 16) Psalm 45:9 describes the queenly consort arrayed in precious gold of Ophir, and at Isaiah 13:11, 12, in the pronouncement against Babylon, the relative rarity of Ophir gold is used to symbolize the scarcity of tyrannical men in Babylon after its fall.

David donated 3,000 talents of gold from Ophir for construction of the temple, gold valued at $1,156,050,000. (1Ch 29:1, 2, 4) Later, the trading fleet of David’s son Solomon regularly brought back from Ophir 420 talents of gold. (1Ki 9:26-28) The parallel account at 2 Chronicles 8:18 reads 450 talents. Some scholars have suggested that this difference came about when letters of the alphabet served as figures—that an ancient copyist could have mistaken the Hebrew numeral letter nun (נ), representing 50, for the letter kaph (כ), standing for 20, or vice versa. However, the evidence is that all numbers in the Hebrew Scriptures were spelled out, rather than represented by letters. A more probable explanation, therefore, is that both figures are correct and that the gross amount brought was 450 talents, of which 420 were clear gain.

In 1946, as confirmation of these Biblical accounts about imports of gold from Ophir, a potsherd was unearthed NE of Tel Aviv-Yafo. Thereon was an inscription saying “Ophir gold to bet horon, thirty shekels.”—Journal of Near Eastern Studies, 1951, Vol. X, pp. 265, 266.

In addition to being a source of a vast quantity of gold, the land of Ophir was also a source of the “algum” trees and precious stones imported by Solomon. (1Ki 10:11; 2Ch 9:10) However, when King Jehoshaphat, a hundred years later, attempted an expedition to that land, it ended in disaster, his “Tarshish ships” being wrecked at Ezion-geber at the head of the Gulf of ʽAqaba.—1Ki 22:48; see TARSHISH No. 4. *From Insight book Vol.2 1988, Published by Jehovah’s Witnesses*)

Origin: (Hebrew, Biblical)

Pronunciation: (O-feer, OH-fear)

Gender: Uni-Sex

 

I was reading my bible and I read this word and name. I think it looks very foreign which it is but that’s apart of the appeal to me. The meanings and history of the name and place are interesting. I really like this name.

Surnames

Perkins

 Patton

 Grimm

 Spicer

 Glass

 Cromwell

 Novak