Middle name

Among royalty and aristocracy, middle names have been used since the late 17th century (and possibly earlier), as exemplified in the name of the Stuart pretender James Francis Edward Stuart (1688–1766).

Despite their relatively long existence in North America, the term middle name was not recorded until 1835, in the periodical Harvardiana.

Major classes of this theme are as follows:[citation needed] In the United States, the middle name is often abbreviated to the middle initial (e.g. Mary Lee Bianchi becomes Mary L.

[citation needed] In countries that primarily speak English—such as Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, the United States, and the United Kingdom—the forename of a relative is sometimes used as one's middle name to honor familial heritage.

In many cases in the United States, however, a person's middle name does not derive from relatives, but is used instead to honor close family friends or notable public figures.

)[6] Other people with single-letter middle names include Robert B. Hollander Jr. and Mark M Davis.

Rarely a person may adopt a middle initial to overcome the problems imposed by systems whose design failed to properly handle the absence of one, or to ensure uniqueness.

In England and the United States, some who choose to be known primarily by their middle name abbreviate their first name as an initial, e.g. J(ohn) Edgar Hoover, J(ohn) Paul Getty, J(ulius) Robert Oppenheimer and F(rancis) Scott (Key) Fitzgerald.

Many politicians use their middle name or its shortened version as a first name—for example, (Addison) Mitch(ell) McConnell, (Willard) Mitt Romney, (Thomas) Jon(athan) Ossoff, (Raymond) Jon Tester, (Rafael Edward) Ted Cruz and (Marion Michael) Mike Rounds are all U.S. senators who use their middle names as first names.

Traditional names in India vary regionally due to its ethnic and religious diversity.

However, diversity exists even here, for instance middle and last names from the traditionally matrilineal Nair community in Kerala are based on the mother's family.

For example, in the case of the well-known statesman, V. K. Krishna Menon, his first name would be Krishna, the V stands for Vengyalil, which is a well known aristocratic Nair family from Kerala that Krishna's mother belonged to, the K stands for Krishnan, his father's name and the surname is Menon, one of the Nair subcastes.

Among the Sikhs of India, many have adopted the middle name Singh or Kaur which mean lion and princess respectively.

If a person has two given names, Jonathan Jose P. Santos, the abbreviated "P" will represent the mother's surname.

There have been a few documented exceptions, such as Benigno S. Aquino III, Jose P. Laurel, and Manuel L. Quezon, whose Western-style middle initials actually stand for their second given names Simeon, Paciano, and Luis respectively.

[17] Occasionally, Scandinavians choose to use their middle name as their surname in everyday life.