Today’s sneak preview is the relatively straightforward Deborah. As it’s quite short, I have also decided to include some of the other bee-themed names…
Deborah ♀
Hebrew: debōrah ‘bee’ – the name of a biblical character. 16th Century. Diminutives: Deb, Debs, Debbie, Debbi, Debby, Debi. Variants: Debora, Debra. Italian: Debora, Portuguese, Spanish: Débora, Modern Hebrew: Devorah, Dvorah. Bearers: Deborah Milton (b.1652), the youngest daughter of the poet John Milton; Deborah Freeman-Mitford, Duchess of Devonshire (b.1920), one of the Mitford Sisters; Deborah Lipp (b.1961); the US Wiccan author; Miss Deborah Jenkyns, a character in Elizabeth Gaskell’s Cranford (1851); Deborah Lee, later Lady Slane, the main character in Vita Sackville West’s All Passion Spent (1931); Deborah Mayfair, the ancestress of the Mayfair Witches in Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches series (1990-94).
Bee ♀ ♂
Despite its sting, the bee is a much beloved creature, cherished for the honey it produces and respected for the important job it does in pollinating flowers. A summer day in a garden is not complete without the gentle, mesmeric sound of a bee buzzing about its business. Bees are symbolic of hard work and cooperation, living and working as they do in hives containing thousands of others. Bees are also strongly associated with the divine. The ancient Egyptians believed that bees spontaneously came into being from the tears of the sun God Ra. In many traditions, the bee is also symbolic of the soul. The word comes from Old English béo ‘bee’, and has cognates across the Germanic languages. Its ultimate source is thought to be from a Proto-Indo-European word meaning ‘to fear’ and thus ‘to quiver’. As a given name, Bee is mostly regarded as a short form for BEATRIX. However, there is also a surname Bee meaning ‘bee’, which probably arose as a nickname, and is the likely source of early examples of Bee as a given male name. Late 17th Century.
Amu ♂
Mi’kmaq: amu ‘bee’.
Gwenynen ♀
Welsh: gwenynen ‘bee’. Early 20th Century.
Madhukar ♂
Indian name. San: madhukara ‘bee’.
Melissa ♀
Greek: melissa ‘bee’. The name of a nymph, credited with inventing the art of keeping bees, as well as being the name of a daughter of a Cretan king, who assisted Amalthea in caring for the infant Zeus. Melissa is also the botanical name for the lemon balm. 17th Century. Diminutive: Mel, Lissa. Bearers: Melissa Joan Hart (b.1976), the US actress, best known for playing Sabrina in the US TV series Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996-2003); Melissa, a Witch in Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso. Melissa also features in Lord Tennyson’s poem The Princess (1847), and in Gilbert and Sullivan’s Princess Ida (1884), which the poem inspired.
Nook of Names
