Finnish names.

Finntroll sings in Swedish.

You know what's so awesome about Finnish names? You meet some totally ordinary-looking white dude, speaks English better than your own mom, and he introduces himself and you've never heard that name before. Ever! It's new to you! And all because Finnish is a non-Indo-European language, so you don't get the otherwise common European phenomenon of everyone's name just being a localized and re-phoneticized version of a name you're already familiar with.

I'm probably being very silly. Feel free to laugh at me.

Jack: Jaakko
John: Joni
Peter: Petri/Petteri
Paul: Pauli
Thomas: Tuomas
Lisa: Liisa
Anna: Anna
Mary: Maria
Katherine/Kate: Kati
Sophie: Sofia

...

Shut up.

But you get my point.

Thank you for your answer. Do you know, by any chance, the most common Swedish surname in Finland?

The Finnish Census website doesn't list more than the ten most common surnames, and unfortunately none of those are Swedish, so I don't know.

In case anyone's interested, the top ten are (in order): Korhonen (according to Wiktionary, korho is an archaic word that either means "deaf" or "proud"), Virtanen (virta = stream), Nieminen (niemi = cape/peninsula), Mäkinen (mäki = hill), Mäkelä (mäki = hill), Hämäläinen (Häme is one of the regions of Finland), Laine (wave), Heikkinen (Heikki is the Finnish equivalent of Henrick), Koskinen (koski = a rapid) and Järvinen (järvi = lake).

Seven out of ten mean something related to the landscape or terrain.

edit: Wikipedia has Top 25, but none of those are Swedish names either.

edited 18th Sep '11 4:09:10 AM by Kerrah

I actually had a good Internet friend years ago whose last name was Mäkelä. She was from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, though, so she didn't umlaut the As.

Earlier this week, I had occasion at work to send something by mail to a dude in Colorado named Tapio Niskanen. Just thought I'd throw that one out there.

Agreed. Shouldn’t this be something of a Discredited Trope by now?

“yö” is even better and “yä” better still. Mainly because they’re virtually impossible for English speakers to actually pronounce!

I don't get why Finns want to highlight only the "Finnicized" names, while actual Finnish names are a lot prettier, Like Lumi, Aino, Eija, Saila, Seija, Aate, Tuija, Satu, Taru, Sini, Tuuli, Tapio, Ahti, Pyry, Onni, Viljo etc

I don't know what the most common Swedish surnames in Finland are, but this Wikipedia list of the most common surnames in Sweden might give you an idea. Yeah, the patronymic inspired surnames are pretty common here. It's also common with names that re made from two nature words mashed together, like Stenbäck (stone pond) or Hedkvist (heath branch).

Swedish surnames are not uncommon in Finland at all. Not sure if I'd go out my way to say they're common - but definitely not uncommon.

Interestingly, the most common Swedish surname I've encountered seems to be Nygren, which doesn't appear on the list there, but that might just be me.

edited 7th Sep '14 2:48:25 PM by Xeroop

Lumi isn't a Finnish name. It means "snow".

It is a Finnish name. Those two things are not mutually exclusive.

[Sorry, new accounts cannot post external links.]

I'm Finnish and actually find most Finnish names very boring. XD There are some extremely ancient, atrocious names in our language, like Jooseppi, Aukusti and Taavetti for guys; Justiina, Henriikka and Aulikki for girls. ...My great-grandpa's name was David, but he was called Taavetti... I prefer David...

That's why I'm determined to choose Finnish-Swedish names for my kids if I ever have any (Sofia, Emma or Ella for a girl; Felix or Valentin for a boy).

One annoying trend I've spotted among Finnish Names is taking English y-ended names like Henry, Tony, Jenny, but pronouncing them as they're written, which doesn't sound very good. Why not just Henri, Toni, Jenni etcetera or other "Finnicized" versions like those mentioned before?

For some reason, I find Jerry to be exception to this.