Ned Cullen
Blog #9: A Birth of A Nickname
Ned Cullen:
Have you ever wondered why someone named Edward is nicknamed Ned? There are multiple names that have this such as Nellie for Ellen which people found odd as you don’t just add an N in a Nickname. John McWhorter says these nicknames can be traced back to a mistake!
How did it happen?
Nickname in old English was Ekename which meant also or other but when people would say “An Ekename” it sounded like “A Nekename” overtime it stayed as Nekename. Same thing happened with other words in old English such “Cut AN otch into Wood” overtime it became “a Notch” because in old English what was heard typically became how it was said overtime where as in modern English everything has an established form. English used to be more like German so as a result from saying “Meen Ed” and once again over time it became “My Ned”.
I was very surprised by the outcome of this Ted-Ed because frankly my nickname is Hope but my real name is Lizbeth, there really is no correlation to my actual name and believed like many other nicknames it was just a common nickname for most Edwards as not every Edward I have known goes by Ed. Seeing the many words that were changed due to auditory error in Old English makes me wonder what more words we have that were a baby of habit!
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