Category Archives: Japanese Names

Rán

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Gender: Feminine
Origin: Old Norse
Meaning: “theft; robbery.”
General Scan (RAWN); Ice (ROWN) like the word Round with the d cut off

The name is borne in Norse mythology by a sea goddess.

The goddess Rán, is the subject of several Old Norse Prose Eddas, including the Skáldskaparmál, in which a poem entitled, Lokesenna, talks of her life and exploits.

According to the Lokesenna, Rán is the wife of Aegir, and with him, she has nine daughters.

Rán is also famous for capturing unsuspecting seafearers with her fish-net. In fact, her fish-net is also recorded in the Volsunga Saga.

According to some sources, she is married to the sea.

The name is still in usage in Iceland and the Faroe Islands. In Iceland, it is often used as a one syllable filler middle name.

As of July 2007, 37 women in Iceland bore this as a first name, while 325 had it as a middle name.

The name can also be a Japanese female name,  meaning “orchid” 蘭

Karin

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Gender: Feminine
Origin: Japanese/Swedish
Japense (KAH-deen)
Swedish (KAW-rin)

In Japanese,depending on the characters used and the spelling, can have a variety of different meanings. The most traditional is its derivation from the Kanji カ (ka) meaning “summer” and リン (rin) meaning “forest; grove”, another translation for the latter element could be from the レイ (rin) meaning “small bell.”

The name is also coinicidentally used as a form of Katherine in Sweden, though with a completely different pronunciation.

Natsu, Natsuko, Natsumi, Natsuye

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Gender: Feminine
Origin: Japanese
Meaning: “summer”
夏
(NAHT-zoo).

Natsu is a popular female Japanese name. It is also a popular name element in many other Japanese female names such as Natsuko “summer child.” 夏子 made of the elements (natsu), “summer” and the popular feminine name suffix of (ko) meaning “child.”

Japanese pronunciation is hard to transliterate for someone who is a native speaker of one of the many Indo-European languages. The O in Natsuko is barely pronounced. It is somewhat akin to the American English pronunciation of the O in Deborah (DEB-ruh; DEB-o-RUH). Hence the pronunciation would be something akin to NATS–ko or NAT-so-KO.

There is also Natsuye, which is made up of the Japanese characters natsu “summer” and the suffix of ye, either denoting a branch or cove. So the name can either mean “summer branch” or “summer cove” and is pronounced something like (NAHTS–weh).

Another name made up of the natsu element is Natsumi, made up of the obvious natsu and the element of み (mi ) “beautiful”, .る (mi) “reality; truth” . Hence it could either mean, “summer truth” or “summer beautiful.”  The pronunciation can be described as something like (NAHT-smee) or (NATSeh-MEE).