Thinking about ”var / [name_m]Ivar[/name_m] recently. I love it in Icelandic, but having the same old cross-cultural concerns!
Pluses
It’s a good old Nordic name
It’s also a traditional English name, as [name_m]Ivor[/name_m]
I think people will recognise it easily in the UK, even though it’s not the same form
Minuses
Icelandic pronunciation is EE-var. Automatic English pronunciation would be EYE-vah or EYE-və.
If I tried to get English (note English, not American - we don’t naturally pronounce terminal r) people to say EE instead of EYE at the beginning, will it just sound like [name_f]Eva[/name_f]?
Would it matter if it did?
I love love it. All the yew-related names are wonderful. The tree is a beautiful one. It’s used to make medicine, poison, lutes and longbows, sometimes living to be thousands of years old, growing wide and gnarled, planted in churchyards, symbolic of transcendence of death… And if you’re into Norse mythology, apparently there’s something in the Eddas about [name_m]Odin[/name_m] hanging from a yew tree (Yggdrasil) and bringing forth the runic alphabet from his visions.
I love the sound of it, with or without the diacritic. I think an English person would tend to hang on the second syllable longer than with [name_f]Eva[/name_f], giving both syllables equal weight as opposed to accenting the first syllable.
Hmm… I see the issue - but with the spelling ”var I would assume EE-var. I know not everyone would, but I’d definitely keep it wherever possible to distinguish it from [name_m]Ivor[/name_m]/[name_m]Ivo[/name_m]/[name_m]Ivan[/name_m] and similar names.
I would pronounce the ending rhyming with car (with a fairly standard British accent), so even without the nasally ‘‘rrr’’ it’s quite distinct from [name_f]Eva[/name_f]'s short ‘vuh’ sound. It may not be correct, but with this pn it doesn’t sound too much like [name_f]Eva[/name_f]. I guess when it’s said quickly, like it would be in everyday speech it may sound like [name_f]Eva[/name_f]… but I don’t think it’s a huge deal.
Anyway - I think it’s fine and quite usable in the UK. He’ll quickly learn to say ‘‘It’s pronounce EE-vah, I’m Icelandic’’ if issues do arise. Plus I think it’s lovely, and I agree that whilst it’s distinctly foreign it’s also very familiar.
Thanks guys! I think you’re right about the pronunciation, I just said it too many times or something.
I’ve actually always found yew trees very creepy, the way the foliage grows so thick and blocks out all the light, and then they’re always in graveyards, and how poisonous they are… This is one of the cases where I would just disregard the meaning, or favour the ‘archer’ interpretation in my mind It’s either yew-warrior or bow-warrior (the same word because as you say, yew is good wood for making bows), so it could be ‘archer’. My Icelandic name etymology book says:
Upruni nafnsins er umdeildur. Það er ef til vill leitt af ýr “ýviður, bogi”, sbr. *iwa-hariR “bogmaður”. Janzén telur nafnið víxlmynd við Ingvar, Yngvar og bendir á því til stuðnings að sami maður hafi til forna bæði verið nefndur ”varr og Yngvarr.
The origin of the name is disputed. It is possibly derived from ýr “yew-wood, bow”, comp. *iwa-hariR “archer”. Janzén considers the name to be a variation of Ingvar, Yngvar and points to the fact that the same man in ancient times was referred to as both ”varr and Yngvarr. (My translation)
It’s either yew-warrior or bow-warrior (the same word because as you say, yew is good wood for making bows), so it could be ‘archer’. My Icelandic name etymology book says: