Beckett: Behind the name

Numb3rs star Diane Farr and her husband Seung Yong Chung just welcomed their son Beckett Mancuso Chung.  Named after Irish playwright Samuel Beckett, he isn’t the first celebrity baby to have the late writer as a namesake. Other celebrity parents who chose Beckett include Melissa Etheridge (1998), Dixie Chick Natalie Maines (2004),Malcolm McDowell (2004) and Conan O’Brien (2005).  PierceBrosnan chose it for his son Paris’s middle name.

The Baby Name Bible: The Ultimate Guide By America’s Baby-Naming Experts co-author Linda Rosencrantz tells us that though Beckett is popular with celebrity parents, it’s not even in the US Top 1000.

Beckett is an English surname, stemming from place names in Devon and Berkshire.  Its meaning is given as both "dweller near the brook" and "bee cottage."  For some people there’s also, in addition to the Samuel Beckettconnection, the association with the 12th century St. Thomas Becket,the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Using last names as a first has been a popular trend for decades, although the more preppy ones like Carter, Parker and Porter are beginning to fade in favor of Irish ones like Brady, Brody, Reagan and Sullivan. Russell Crowe named his second son Tennyson.

Other writer’s surnames that are popular for first names are Bronte (for the Bronte sisters) and Zola (for Emile Zola) (though most people don’t tie it to the French writer).  Some writers’ first names that are sometimes used include Dashiell (Hammett), Anais (Nin), Colette, Flannery (O’Connor), Cormac (McCarthy), Harper (Lee), Langston (Hughes), Willa (Cather), Zane (Grey), Zora (Neale Hurston).

The Baby Name Bible: The Ultimate Guide By America’s Baby-Naming Experts is available in paperback from Amazon for $9.95. Read our interview with Linda here and check out their site, BabyNameBible.com.

Does your child have an author’s name?

Comments

Just to clarify, it’s Zora Neale Hurston, not “Thurston”

- Sally on March 17th, 2007

I love Byron for a boy.

- Ana on March 17th, 2007

I don’t have any kids yet, but one of the names that I like for a boy is Zane partly because of Zane Grey (my family are huge fans). I hope it doesn’t become popular in the next few years…lol. Zane is also supposed to be the English form of John.

- Ash on March 17th, 2007

I would definitely consider Emerson [as in Ralph Waldo] for a son. And also I would consider Holden for a son, though not an author, Holden Caufield (sp?) is one of my favorite literary characters ever.

- Jess from ohio on March 17th, 2007

My son, born in 1999, is named Becket Spencer, and he was indeed named after St. Thomas Becket. I chose that name long before he was born. I felt it was a strong name and really liked it. His middle name Spencer was after the Princess of Wales, Diana Spencer.

We kept up a literay theme with his sister, Arwen Halo….Becket chose her middle name

- Bgirlsquirrel on March 20th, 2007

According to http://www.ssa.gov/cgi-bin/babyname.cgi

Beckett was the 667th most popular name for boys in the U.S. in 2007.

- Steve O. on January 22nd, 2009