Forenames: Nexus Customs

[mimi-sardinia.livejournal.com]

I felt a need to write this out.


Forenames are the second name in a full Nexus name. To give my most familiar examples:

Senna Daani Khyilenna Malaasa-Praadss
Senna Orin Mimnristriqua Malaasa-Praadss.

With Khyi and Mim, the forenames are Daani and Orin.

First off, forenames are, culturally similar to middle names. They are not usually the given name a person is called by, and sometimes are names from family members, or ancestral names. It is far more common for them to family or ancestral in the upper classes of Nexus society.

When they are ancestral, the name is usually a shortening of the family member or ancestor. "Daani" is a shortening of Daanika, "Orin" is a shortening of Oraania.

Forenames can also be shortenings of the name of a mentor the person wishes to honour. Often a person who wishes to do so has to change their forename however, and there are formalities involved in doing so, especially if their original forename is from a living family member.

These formalities involve going to the kin the original forename came from, explaining why the person wishing to change their name believes their mentor is worthy of such an honour, and to explain that no disrespect is intended to the family member their old forename came from.

Khyilenna had a slightly different course of events surrounding the change of her forename to this. She was originally forenamed after her mother's sister, but when her fire dancing ability was discovered, her parents and aunt decided to change her forename to "Daani" straight away. Khyilenna never went through the process of explaining the change to her aunt because her aunt agreed on it long before it would become an issue, and had no objection to Khyilenna taking a forename after her great grandmother instead (Daanika Malaasa, grandmother to the Nexus Emperor - Khyilenna's father - and the last remaining Fire Dancer before Khyilenna).

Mimnristriqua on the other hand has never considered changing her forename, holding the opinion that of all people in her life, Oraania deserves the honour of having her grand-daughter forenamed after her.