30 Days of Writing - Question 3

3. How do you come up with names, for characters (and for places if you’re writing about fictional places)?

In original fiction, i often look in history books or other works about the country or region, whose culture is similar to the culture of my fictional country, to get a feeling, how names are used and written.
But I do not take them as they are in reality, I play with them. So as example: the welsh goddess Arianrhod becomes Arienredh ore Aranrei, Rhiannon becomes Rhianod or Rienrel. My Meridwen was put together from the egyptian name Merit and the celtic ending -wen, before I dicovered, that it is a real name.
Sometimes I just play with syllables: Daran, Mamarabe, Katayane, Dahelon

It is very important for me, that names of places, artifacts and people from one region fit together, so that my readers can recognize them: "A these people are from the Highland-Baronies, these are from Yjan Calliorn or the southern countries.

In fanfictions I use the names which are given by the universe I write in.


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