Thinking of naming baby girl Mari (MAR-ee) since Mary is family name on husband’s side.
I know it can be a common Japanese name and also is short for different Latina names like Marisol etc. I’ve seen online that it can be a Norwegian name as well, but I’m less familiar with that. I imagine it can also be short for many many other names like Marisa, Amara, Marie as well.
Neither husband or I are Japanese or Latino, so curious to hear if this is too ethnically confusing for our kid. Interested to hear especially from folks who have heard girls names “Mari” in different cultures.
My partner is Japanese and wouldn’t be offended, but of course, he doesn’t speak for all Japanese people. I think because it is found in so many cultures it’s fine? I like it too for its sound, but didn’t like some of the non-Japanese meanings associated with it. So instead I put [name_f]Marin[/name_f] on my list. You could also do [name_f]Mariel[/name_f], [name_f]Marleen[/name_f], [name_f]Merryn[/name_f], [name_f]Marisol[/name_f], [name_f]Marigold[/name_f], [name_f]Marina[/name_f], etc. and reasonably use this nickname.
There are quite a few different origins and usages of the name [name_f]Mari[/name_f] though time as a given name and as a nickname. It’s Basque, Japanese, Welsh, Norwegian, Estonian, Swedish, Hungarian, etc. My favorite being the Basque goddess of weather and fertility.
I wouldn’t worry about it. I don’t think the name would be ethnically confusing at all.
I don’t know many of its roots but I don’t think you need to worry about it too much.
It looks like a variant of [name_f]Mary[/name_f], and that’s fairly cross cultural. To me it looks Irish because I know a couple of Irish women named things like ‘[name_f]Mari[/name_f]-[name_f]Ruth[/name_f]’ and ‘[name_f]Mari[/name_f]-[name_f]Elizabeth[/name_f]’.
I really like the long name Marinette with the nickname [name_f]Mari[/name_f]. But I think you could use just [name_f]Mari[/name_f] or any longer name and it would be fine.