Peculiar Names

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Nov 25, 1909

WHEN one hears a child's name in America, one can almost immediately tell whether the child is a boy or a girl, but it is not so in Africa. No one can tell except by acquaintance to whom such names as Shilling, Sixpence, Penny, or Pound belong. One could hardly imagine that Donkey, In-the-way, Let-us-see, and Me could be names of children, but so goes the style in African nomenclature. With very little difficulty you might, perhaps, decide that England, Sunday, Waistcoat, Basket, and Office are boys, and that Lea, Rose, Miriam, and Ladywatch are girls. But even one learned in the art of naming children in Africa would be at a loss to pick out their owners by such names as In-the-sack, In-the-bush, Pine-town, To-tremble, and Watch-no-good. There are a few names common to both sexes, such as Charlie, Soap, and Table; and some are called by the very suggestive names, She-is-dead and We-die-for-Charlie. In Africa, at least, one may well echo Shakespeare and exclaim, “What's in a name!”—Selected.

A YOUNG Bengali student came to me the other day to ask for an explanation of difficult passages in a book he is reading. When I asked him his name, he said, “Sát Kori,” which means “seven cowrie shells,” and explained the reason of this curious name. His mother had had several children before him, but all had died; so, like many other Hindu mothers, she thought God or the evil one had a grudge against her, and, if he could, would take this last little one also. But if he could be brought to think the child some one's else, or not worth taking, he might leave it alone. So she called the nurse who attended her in her illness, and sold the baby to her for seven cowrie shells (less than a tenth of a farthing), and, lest the transaction should be forgotten, gave the boy the name of “Seven Cowries,” by which he has been known every since. I asked him if he thought it had made any difference. He said, “Perhaps; at any rate I did not die.” So a university undergraduate more than half believes that one can cheat God by a trick like that!—F. W. Hinton.