Why william shortened to bill

The name Margaret has a variety of different nicknames. Some are obvious, as in Meg, Mog and Maggie, while others are downright strange, like Daisy. The name Ted is yet another result of the Old English tradition of letter swapping.

Since there were a limited number of first names in the Middle Ages, letter swapping allowed people to differentiate between people with the same name. It was common to replace the first letter of a name that began with a vowel, as in Edward, with an easier to pronounce consonant, such as T. Of course, Ted was already a popular nickname for Theodore, which makes it one of the only nicknames derived from two different first names.

Can you name the others? Since Medieval times, Harry has been a consistently popular nickname for boys named Henry in England. Henry was also very popular among British monarchs, most of whom preferred to be called Harry by their subjects. Of course, Harry is now used as a given name for boys. In , it was the rd most popular name for boys in the United States. One reason for its upsurge in popularity is the huge success of those amazing Harry Potter books. There are no definitive theories on how Jim became the commonly used nickname for James, but the name dates back to at least the s.

Jim has since shed its racial past, and is once again a popular first name for boys all by itself, sans James. Sally was primarily used as a nickname for Sarah in England and France. Same is true for Molly, a common nickname for Mary. Though Sally from the Peanuts never ages, the name itself does and has declined in popularity in recent years. Today, most girls prefer the original Hebrew name Sarah. BY David K. There isn't any overarching reason as to why nicknames develop that seem to make no logical sense.

But there are some good stories behind some of the them. We reached out to Cleveland Kent Evans — psychology professor, author of "The Great Big Book of Baby Names", name columnist for the Omaha World Herald and former president of the American Name Society — to clue us in on the surprising origins of some of the most perplexing English nicknames. Let's start with a fun one. Unlike most English nicknames, this one does not come from England.

Chuck is an entirely American invention with a colorful backstory. So how did he get the nickname "Chuck"? Connors grew up in the Chinatown neighborhood of Lower Manhattan and even learned enough Chinese to earn him the unofficial title of "Mayor of Chinatown. When Connor died in , some of the New York papers erroneously printed his given name as Charles, making the first if false connection between Charles and Chuck.

But since Charles lacked any catchy alternative nicknames at the time, Chuck stuck. Hank is another American nickname, but its origins are murkier.

The most likely explanation, says Evans, is that Hank is derived from Henk, a Dutch nickname for Henry that would have been used by large the communities of Dutch settlers in New York and New Jersey in the 17th and 18th centuries. But more interesting is the fact — little known to most Americans — that the original nickname for Henry was Harry.

Prince Harry's real name is Prince Henry of Wales. Evans says that Harry isn't so much a nickname of Henry as a mispronunciation of Henri, the original French form of Henry that arrived in England with the 11th-century Norman Conquest. Since few people could read or write in Medieval England, they pronounced the new name as best they could, sounding more like Harry than Henry. Many of the most common English nicknames can be traced back to Medieval times, when half the men in England were named either John or William, and the other half were Robert or Richard.

Evans says that inherited surnames didn't even show up until around Before that, people used occupations or lineage as last names: John the Smith or Robert son of William. In those days, nicknames were essential to keeping Richard your neighbor straight from Richard your brother.

A popular trick was to create rhyming names. The original shortened form of Richard was Rick, which became Hick and Dick. The letters "H" and "D" were popular rhyming consonants, apparently, because the original nickname for Robert wasn't Bob, but instead was Hob or Dob.

Bob arrived much later, Evans says, but you can still see the original nicknames in English surnames like Hobson and Dobson. Credit the Irish with this one. Charles is a masculine given name predominantly found in English and French speaking countries. It is from the French form Charles of a Germanic name Karl….

John is an ever-popular name. Seventeenth-century English texts still spelled the name Iohn. Since then, it has been spelled in its current form, John. The feminine form changed from Jehanne to Joanne, Joan and Jo. Johnny is an English language personal name. It is usually an affectionate diminutive of the masculine given name John, but since the 16th century, it has sometimes been a given name in its own right for both males and females but most common with men. Carlo is an Italian and Spanish masculine given name and a surname.

As an Italian name it is a form of Charles. As a Spanish name it is a short form of Carlos. Begin typing your search term above and press enter to search. Press ESC to cancel. Ben Davis May 28, Why is Bill Short Form for William? Is Bill a short name for William?