Punjabi Names & Their Meanings
Dr. Rajwant Singh Chilana
Surrey, BC: Asian Publications, 2012. 192p.
$19.95
By Krishan Bector
By writing this book Dr. Chilana has provided a source for Punjabi names to the parents who wish to
name their babies . Dr. Chilana ,an Associate Professor (Emeritus) of the University of Illinois ,Urbana-Champaign, USA had always felt the need of an exhaustive reference source on this topic when he found that several publications are available on Christian, Jewish and Muslim names but none on Punjabi names and their meanings. This compilation is an outcome of several years of his research work which is quite evident from the comprehensive work he has done. The book meets the long standing need of the parents who are in quest of names for their newborns.
The book has been divided into five sections namely : 1.Introduction,2.Naming Ceremonies among Hindus and Sikhs,3. First Names with meanings,4.Punjabi Honorifics and (5) Punjabi Nick Names.
Name of a person being a very significant part of his personality so selection of name has always been a crucial decision for the parents. Name of person reflects the nationality, culture and the lineage of a person. Even though first name, middle name and the surname put together form the legal name of
a person still the first name is exceedingly important component of the name of a person. The names according to the learned author, are usually meaningful, inspirational and depict devotion to some divinity and can be after sun, moon, flowers ,historical or mythical heroes etc. No doubt the environment, the country where one is living does impact naming of newborns.
In the same section the need and the procedure of name change has been given.
However comprehensive compilation may be, it cannot be exhaustive because coining new names goes on. Many names are not meaningful, but sound good, for example the name of my friend is Parvesh (enter) which is not significant. Compounding words are also common such as Indarbir, Indardeep, Indarjeet, Indarjot etc.
Instantly at birth the babies are not invested with the names, a special ceremony is performed called : Namkaran among Sikhs a Namkaran Sanskar among Hindus . A saintly person performs the ceremony by invoking divinities to bless the new babe and picks up the letter of the alphabet .The baby is then given a name starting with that letter. The Granthi ( priest ) or Pandit suggests some names to the parents for the baby. The names they suggest are limited, here the book opens up a very wide choice
to the parents ,particularly those who are living in the Western countries. The book gives the meaning of each and every first name. Among Sikhs the middle name is gender based , Kaur ( princess ) is for female child and Singh ( lion ) for the male child. This is not binding on the Hindus.
Major portion of the book : page 9 to 182 lists over seven thousand contemporay first names in alphabetical order along with their meanings. This can also help parents to coin new names .
Many people don’t know the meaning of their names. Here the book can be of immense help to them. The book doesn’t touch last names as they are countless but it does talk of Honorifics such as Baba, Giani Khalsa and Diwan with appendage ji which is a culture based word used as a mark of respect.
In the last section some nick names have been listed.
The book also refers to some of clippings and modification of the first names to facilitate pronunciation such as Harjinder becomes Harj and Manmohan becomes Moe etc
There is another tendency to treat the name of one’s native village of a person as the last name, for example .Badal, Dosanjh ,Longowal. Badal refers to Parkash Singh Badal . People can figure out the person from the mere mention of the name of the village. This tendency had not been touched. I recall once my daughter said “ Barnala is coming to Patiala”. It clearly meant that Surjit Singh Barnala is coming to Patiala.
The language of book is simple ,and the printer Star Print –O-Bind ,New Delhi has given it a very impressive form. In my opinion the book should be a treated as a pride possession for the parents. It will amazingly embellish your book shelf.
