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Where Do The Names For Legion Members Originate From?


Operative

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Imperial naming conventions are difficult to pin down, but the most unusual thing I've noticed is just how few Anglo-Saxon and Biblical names there are. You don't see a lot of Johns, James', Or Davids. Thankfully, you don't see many American names either, because I don't know how seriously I could take Admiral Jalen, Guardsmen North West, or Canoness Apple.

 

I know what you mean, I can't take seriously a Raven Guard named Agapito...Is an unusual name, and kind of a joke name around here. Partly because "pito" is a colloquial synonym to penis so...

 

 

Imperial naming conventions are difficult to pin down, but the most unusual thing I've noticed is just how few Anglo-Saxon and Biblical names there are. You don't see a lot of Johns, James', Or Davids. Thankfully, you don't see many American names either, because I don't know how seriously I could take Admiral Jalen, Guardsmen North West, or Canoness Apple.

 

for the record, Jalen, North West and Apple are hardly common enough to be called North American names. they are purely the creation of few egocentric individuals with more money than sense.

 

WLK

 

 

Legionary Bryce Johnson of the Night Lords Legion always felt like he should've moved to Nova Hollywood to pursue his music career. Disappointed by being forced to join the VIII Legion, and hating how his adoptive Primarch father wanted him to become a psychopathic murderer like all his other brothers, decidedly stayed loyal after the events of Isstvan V. He no longer speaks to his father or siblings, saying nonsensical things like 'they wouldn't let him grow as a being' and 'he felt like he was drowning in bourgeois life' to the Terran Investigators during his detention. 

 

 

Could be worse, could have been Moon Unit or Dweezil.  Pretty sure they didn't make it off Istvaan 3.

Posted · Hidden by Brother-Chaplain Kage, January 10, 2015 - Off topic
Hidden by Brother-Chaplain Kage, January 10, 2015 - Off topic

American Hollywood names?

 

Hell, I'm more worried about the internet.

 

Captain Doge Moon-Moon of the XVI reporting for duty, sir!

 

Like the legendary Leeroy Jenkins did he charge . . .

....Thats a great idea for a Suicide Legion Champion: Captain Leeroy Jenkins

Iron hands do seem to have a few regal names dotted about in them, for example: Amadeus, Ignatius, Gabriel and Septus.

 

Although I know Gabriel is a Hebrew name with obvious biblical origin, Ignatius was also a Christian Saint, Amadeus has Latin origin and Septus could be a slight change on the Latin word "Septum" which is now used in biology to denote tissues which seems to be a joke seeing as the name is born by an Iron Hand (A morlock veteran no less). Or Septus could be a shortening of the Latin name "Septimus".

 

But my point is: where is the link and what do I class them as, or should I just add: Hebrew and Latin?

Terran Night Lords were recruited from the Biggest Terran Prison so I'd say anything goes since there would be criminals from all walks of life in that lightless pit.

 

For Nostromans (is...is that how you say it?) I'd go with w/e with a slight Latin/Persian twist, maybe?

Thanks Slipstreams and EVERYONE who so far has contributed!

 

Now All we need to do is fill in the few remaining gaps. Also if anyone has managed to identify prefixes and suffixes then please post them too.

 

Thanks, Operative

For the Sons Of Horus, I think we can go with some Nordic and some Hebrew; mostly due to Loken (Nordic) and Ezekyle Abaddon (Hebrew).

 

But we also have Egyptian (Horus; pretty obvious, lol), Middle Eastern with Tarik though his Last Name is Torgaddon and we have Aximand, Maloghurst, Falkus Kibre, Iacton Qruze and a bunch of others; just as varied.

 

Though, in Lokens case, his First Name is Garviel which is pretty close to Gabriel.

 

For the World Eaters, just be creative with nouns about Carnage (Khârn), Anger (Angron) and things to that effect :P On a more serious note, I wouldn't know.

I think they've kindof just picked names as and when they needed to for characters as opposed to setting out any kind of naming conventions for most of the legions. Some there is a general theme, White Scars generally have Asian sounding names, Thousand Sons are Egyptian/Middle Eastern, but most of the legions are just a mishmash of names.

Calas - Portugese? Spanish? French?

Ignatius - Spanish? Latin?

Nathaniel - Hebrew?

Garro - French? Spanish?

Ullis - German? Russian?

Solon - Greek?

Decius - Roman?

Durak - Czech?

Meric - Welsh? English? German?

Voyen - German?

Khorak - Indian? Middle Eastern?

Hakur - Russian? Middle Eastern? Indian?

Ingo Pech and Herzog are for sure german names, the first one means either bad luck or the sticky juice of trees in English, the second is a title like prince or baron. And Ingo is a usual german name. But it's the Alpha Legion, so they seem to be from everywhere or nowhere. ;)
Posted · Hidden by Brother-Chaplain Kage, January 10, 2015 - Off topic
Hidden by Brother-Chaplain Kage, January 10, 2015 - Off topic

American Hollywood names?

 

Hell, I'm more worried about the internet.

 

Captain Doge Moon-Moon of the XVI reporting for duty, sir!

 

"Wow. Much lodge. So Chaos. Very false Emperor. Much burning galaxy. Wow!"

FWIW, the naming conventions I've previously used are the following; its not exclusive by any means, but hopefully the links and examples are food for thought!
 
I Legion: Angelic names, Arthurian names, plus anything from the various other knightly myths. So, Uriel, Cogreavance, Roland, etc.

III Legion: Byzantine names with a few Armenian bits thrown in. So, Milo Sagetelian, Nero Skeuopoios, etc.

IV Legion: I haven't done any IV Legion yet, but I'd have thought a pretty eclectic mix with a vague Greek feel and losts of short hard-sounding names. Perhaps not Classical Greek though as that's a bit overused; Mycenaean perhaps or Minoan? So Glaukos Karst, or Onit Beniah, etc.
 
V Legion: Mongols all the way, ideally with names that match their character somehow. Some Chinese and other Turkic names in the mix wouldn't be bad either. So Khulan, Ochigin etc.
 
VI Legion: Vikings, with a proper epithet. So Runolf Halftroll, Steinn Kraka, etc. 
 
VII Legion: Frankish, Lombard and Visigothic names with other eclectic ones thrown into the mix to demonstrate the Legion's diversity. So, Ekhard Berenger, Salvador Chang, Ludolf Harz, and the like.
 
VIII Legion: I've never been able to work out the Night Lords at all so I'll skip this one...
 
IX Legion: Angelic names, as above, mixed in with Shakespearean character names and Renaissance Italians. The use of an Angelic name seems to happen as a title. So, Ilya Mercutio (known as Apsinthiel), or Bassanio Palamon, (known as Nuriel).

X Legion: All sorts, a bit like the Iron Warriors, but with a decidedly Hebrew bent. So Imit Basarab, or Avram Kal, etc.

XII Legion: Given the World Eaters come from all over, I went for the names of aggressive dogs but in a variety of different languages, combined with a hard-sounding forename. So, Olev Molossus, Vikram, Svana, etc.

XIII Legion: Got to be Roman, surely? Nice and easy.
 
XIV Legion: No single rule here; I went for short, hard sounding names. Turkish ones were particularly useful. So, Durak Gorgal, Gulen Ertug, etc.
 
XV: Egyptian yes, but also Zoroastrian, to show the Legion's recruitment from modern Iran. So, Manush Vifranavaz, Neferhotep, Khamose, etc.

XVI: Semitic names, particularly Punic, Phoenician and Hittite. So, Hamilcar Bast, Lev Abakhol, etc.

 

XVII: Colchis clearly has a thing for single syllable names (ie Kor, Kal, Tal) so I combine that with either a Middle Eastern Diety or a Demon (often these end up being the same thing). So, Kol Moloch, Bel Shadrak, etc.

 

XVIII: A weird mix of Zoroastrian and Zulu seems to work quite well, just with apostophes thrown in; so Zarin, R'ushna, H'shedar, etc. 

 

XIX: I never worked this one out, but for Terran Ravens I quite liked Maori names that could also pass as Asian if you squinted.

 

XX: Alpharius, obviously. Beyond that, anything goes, but I quite liked Boer and Russian names for some reason. So, Reno Petrus, Leonid Tenko, etc...

Imperial fists sound rather Germanic after taking german I mean come on sigsimund sounds rather german to me. Blood angels are very Renaissance Italy and actually and have some well I mean eastern nameslike Amit which is Hindi, Hebrew, Bengali, and Marathi. Another example is our high warden Dakha Berun. Dhaka is the oldest city in Bangladesh. Though they are definitely more Renaissance Italian especially after the heresy.

I really like EdT's summary.

 

On VIII

(A) nostraman, sing.; nostramanii, pl.

 

(B) While a lot of names in the novels sound harsh (Sevatar, Xarl), I always imagine Nostroman lingo melodic in sound and oddly beautiful descriptive: rather "the sea of thought" literally translating something like (Brain) liquor fluid.

Namewise, I personally go for mediterean, slavic and asian and estrange the spelling - since I often imagine pre-Curze Nostramo culture with structures from Mafia, Russian Mob and Yakuzza.

 

This would work itself into legionary names as well with their Legion (non birth) names from gang Tags, self aggrandizing descriptiond and nicknames or derigatory slander when translated to low gothic ("Four Fingers", "Hatebringer", "Catsqueal","Eater of Hearts" - you get the idea)

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