Finding a name that we both love for a child is sometimes complicated. Finding two first names on which we agree is sometimes an obstacle course. Some parents seem to have gotten lost on this path, to the point of choosing crazy first names for their twins.
Fortunately, civil registrars watch over and lay down a few rules (and sometimes their veto) when parents offer too fanciful names for their children. As the list of names banned in France proves.
But the parents of twins are sometimes also a little bewildered and will be put back on the right track when their requests are too extravagant or sometimes delusional. The French prize certainly goes to the parents who, in 2006, wanted to name their sons Happy and Patrist. Certainly fans of Snow White and somewhat easy puns, they were fortunately slowed in their tracks by the Montpellier Court of Appeal, which refused the first names, arguing that they “are by nature, because of their character fanciful, even ridiculous, to create difficulties and effective embarrassment for the future life of the child.” Also in France, the administration said no to Breton parents wishing to call their twins Port and Starboard.
These names of twins that made the civil status services jump
- Crazy first names : Starsky and Hutch, Autumn and Summer, Fish and Chips, Benson and Hedges (these last two pairs were refused in New Zealand).
- Palindrome first names (which can be read both ways): Heaven and Nevaeh, Noel and Leon
- Names that are too close phonetically : Como and Pachomius, Theo and Thea, carla and clara, Sandrine and Cedrine
However, in France, first names justin and justin were accepted for twins in 2008. This is reminiscent of the story of those parents who named their twins by the same first name…which is also their last name.
Silence a stubborn rumor
Among our neighbors across Quiévrain, in 2009, little twins from Charleroi escaped the first names Vagina and Clitoris. And to put an end to an old rumor that has been circulating on parental forums for years: according to INSEE, these first names have never been attributed in France. So, once and for all, NO! Nobody knows someone who knows someone whose daughter is called Clitorine.