I always love to hear the story of a name. Today Caitlin Houston shares the story behind her birth names.
Yesterday I read a great story to my third grade class about the significance of names. In “The Name Jar” by Yangsook Choi, a young girl, Unhei, moves from Korea to America. She worries students will be unable to pronounce her name, so she tells her class that she doesn’t have a name.
By the end of the story you learn how every name has a meaning and that we should be proud of the name we are given at birth. For homework, students researched the origin of their name and asked their parents why they chose it. The other third teacher and I quickly learned our students have some of the most unique stories behind their names.
Here is the meaning of my birth name, Caitlin.
Its origin is “Gaelic/Celtic variant of the Old French name Cateline.” Caitlín is the Irish variant of Cateline, an old French form of Katherine, is generally pronounced like “KOYT leen” and “ KAYT lin.” The meaning of Katherine is unknown. It is originally associated with the Greek Aikaterine, which is of uncertain (and debatable) origin. Later, the spelling was changed (to Katherine) to associate it with the word “katharos,” which means “pure.”
Long story short, my name means “pure.”
However, my Mom didn’t choose my name based on the fact my father is 75% Irish. She loved English poet Dylan Thomas and his wife’s name was Caitlin. Clearly she also knew we would look identical.
So, what’s the story behind your name?
Leave a Reply