Yes, I have been both cursed and blessed with an unusual name. I didn't ever actually consider writing a post just about my own name, but for historical preservation and because, there are are quite a few things I can actually write about I decided I needed to write this.

I have often been in circles where people thought I was using a handle. I stopped signing any of my works with handles or made up names a little over thirty years ago. When I was doing a lot of game development for the Neverwinter Nights Community people always thought I was using a character name. I was not. Even here in the steemit.com community we have @sirlunchthehost that thinks my handle @dwinblood makes a great elven player name. Yet, that handle is actually nothing more than my first initial followed by my last name (surname). Both my first and my last name have stories and research from within my life. The number one thing I've had to deal with concerning both of my names here has been in pronunciation.

I have often told people I really didn't care how they pronounced my name if we are not going to regularly interact. I will say from experience that if I work with someone for like two years and they still introduce me to people in a meeting or a conference call as Deeva Winblood that I get silently irked. After years of interaction it is either pure laziness, apathy, or disrespect/disregard from the person. Fortunately, I only have ever had that happen once.

Deva

This name actually was inspired by the Hindu religion from my Hippie parents. It essentially means God in Hindi. I was always told by my parents that my first and original middle name combined meant "The Heavenly Traveler who brings joy" which is appropriately hippie like. I suspect it had a slightly different meaning than that knowing what my biological father was like. This name is not uncommon in places like India, though I was born in the United States. There are also some villages/towns named Deva at a few places in Europe. I've never personally encountered another Deva in my life. I have heard of them. In the United States I've heard twice of references to two different women named Deva. I've also encountered my name on the TV Series Banshee as the name for the daughter. The series was a bonus. They pronounced it properly.

I have explained how to pronounce Deva in many different ways. Here are my three most common approaches.

Dayva, Daeva, or Dave+Uh.

Yet, it is interesting how difficult this can prove to be for many minds. I can explain how to pronounce it and they can repeat it and then they will see it in writing and call me Diva. I've gone so far with coworkers to tell them not to call me Diva unless they wanted me to sing badly... This backfired as one friendly coworker thought it was funny. After belting out "The Love Boat" for him a couple of times I realized he enjoyed it too much and this was no deterrent.

I have had my name pronounce Diva, Devan, Delva, Devo, Dave, Davis, etc. Diva is by far the most popular way people will pronounce it. Proper pronunciation is so rare that it is very noticeable to me when a person does it the first time without me telling them how. Yet, why it is like this is odd.

Devastate = has a EH sound not an EE sound.
Devalue = has the EE sound.
Devan = would be pronounced with an EH sound.
Eva = is typically properly pronounced AYVA.

We already have the word Diva which is pronounced Deeva and is used for female singers of prominence like Cher, Celine Dione, Mariah Carrey, etc.

Somehow I end up with that as the most common pronunciation and I am uncertain why this occurs. I'd actually expect the EH sound to be most common.

It was interesting being a Dungeons & Dragons fan in my youth. In the first edition AD&D there was a creature called an Astral Deva. This creature combined with a Planetar, and a Solar provided the group of creatures that best fit the concept of an Angel.

I imagine that most U.S. D&D players were likely calling that an Astral Diva which paints less impressive images in my mind. Properly it was an Astral Dayva. With later editions of D&D they expanded the varieties of Devas by quite a bit and they started referring to them as Angel. This is also partially why the Neverwinter Nights community thought I was using a character name rather than my actual name.

I also had some people in High School that would intentionally call me Devo for the four years we were in high school together. You could consider it intentionally being a jerk, dick, or possibly an early form of Trolling before such a term existed.

Winblood

Winblood is mispronounced as well, though I cannot blame people for not knowing the proper way to pronounce it. The story behind this name begins at Ellis Island.

Anders Magnus Winblad (W prononounced V as in Vine) arrived at Ellis Island from Sweden as he was immigrating to the United States. For some reason Ellis Island did not want people to keep their original names. They would enter the island from one point and when they exited from another point they would have a different name.

Anders Magnus Winblad would be changed to the name Andrew William Winblood after Ellis Island. This last name Winblood is actually pronounced Wine+Blood as that is what Winblad meant as well. So my last name is actually pronounced Wine Blood, not Win Blood.

Andrew (formerly Anders) would go on to have several children. All of them kept the last name Winblood pronounced Wineblood with the exception of one. One of his children apparently had their name changed to Wineblood and added the E into their name. I suspect they had a much easier life in terms of pronunciation. They also missed the adventure and interest that could come from a chance to have an exchange over the name.

Middle Name

My middle name is Bryson and it has actually never had pronunciation issues. This was my last name from birth to around age six. I was adopted by my step father at age six and I took his last name Winblood. We chose to make my original surname be my middle name.

The most interesting information about Bryson is that it is another one of those names that has some interesting naming conventions. It also has some redundancy built into it.

Bryson is a derivative of Ap Rhys or some times represented as Ab Rhys. Ab/Ap essentially meant SON OF. So Ap Rhys meant Son of Rhys. This is where surnames such as Price, Brice, etc are likely to have originated from.

Bryson goes the extra mile of throwing in an extra redundant Son. Bryson is essentially Son of Rhys Son.

Closing

Thanks for letting me ramble on about my own name. This is now preserved in the blockchain and hopefully will be helpful if any of my descendants or relatives need any genealogical information. I am also NOT a Hindu, or any organized religion, and my Hippie parents did not raise me with any Hindu knowledge despite my name.

Steem On!