Saga A List of SW Names and Their Meanings

You could simply translate the two elements of Obi-Wan as well. Obi means Heart.

 

According to Wikipedia, Sith is the spelling in Scots Gaelic. In Irish Gaelic, although the pronunciation is essentially the same, the modern form is "Si" and an archaic, but common, alternative version is "Sidhe."

You're quite right: probably the malevolent faeries of Celtic lore were indeed in Lucas's mind when he named his evil knights. But Burroughs' monstrous Barsoomian wasp likely was an influence as well. Quite a lot of the names in SW pack in multiple allusions at once--just check out my analyses of "Carlist Rieekan" and "Mace Windy" above.

PS: In what language does obi mean "heart"? I'm only aware of its meaning in Japanese, where it's "belt"--as in "sword-belt," or kenobi. Not that it couldn't mean both at once in different languages, of course.

 

A curiosity about names...

Here in Brazil, some characters have names which somehow got conflict to other portuguese words in such a way (embarassing or funny) that demanded the dubbers to contact Lucasfilm and explained the problem (what people would "hear" while they were watching the movies)...

They have suggested alternative names, and Lucalsfilm accepted saying "Lets not ruin Mr. Lucas's work."

BTW, only the Star Wars fans know and refer to those characters by their real names....

I wonder if something like this had happened in other countries....
I know that Vader means FATHER in dutch....
So, imagine the irony: an unintentional spoiler!!

 

It is an African language.

 

So now I'm curious - what are some of the Brazilian character names?

 

Panaka sounds like "panaca", which means "dork" / "idiot".
He was renamed as Panas.

Dooku sounds like "do cú", and Sifo Dyas sounds like "se fodia".
These terms are very obscene.....
They were renamed as Dookan and Zaifo-Vias.

Han sounds like "rã", which means "frog".
They didn't change his name, but the first dubbing (before the Special Edition) would some times call him "Solo" instead.

 

One other possible association of the name Obi-Wan occurs to me: a reference to Abraham van Helsing, the aged doctor and vampire hunter in Bram Stoker's Dracula.

This isn't as far-fetched as it seems: in the 1974 rough draft, Princess Leia's principal handmaiden is named Mina (as in Stoker's heroine, Mina Murray).

And Leia's own name, beginning with an L, brings to mind the other major female character in Dracula: Mina's best friend and Dracula's first victim, the beautiful golden-haired Lucy Westenra. (Leia, too, has golden hair in Ralph McQuarrie's paintings from 1975.)

 

Sidious - short for insidious : causing harm in a way that is gradual or not easily noticed and a : awaiting a chance to entrap : treacherous

b : harmful but enticing.

Thanks Merriam Webster.

Interesting definitions here, had no idea Vader was Dark Water. I enjoy name creation when it comes to characters.

 

In the 1973 Journal of the Whills outline, the surname of the narrator Chuiee Two Thorpe probably comes from Jim Thorpe, a famous American athlete of the early 20th century. Thorpe competed at both Olympic and professional levels, and achieved success in such diverse sports as baseball, basketball, and American football. His namesake CJ Thorpe, as a daring space pilot and Jedi Knight, was to be similarly multi-talented.

Interestingly, Jim Thorpe was actually multiracial, being of mixed white and Native American ancestry. This probably increased the appeal of his surname to GL--as it brings to mind Martin Pawley, the youthful protagonist of John Ford's The Searchers, who is one-eighth Native American himself.

The middle name of CJ Thorpe's father, Han Dardell Thorpe, likely derives from the Dardanelles, the outer strait at the mouth of the Sea of Marmara in Turkey--which controls naval access to Istanbul, and was historically the boundary between Europe and Asia. This latter fact again brings to mind the mixed heritage of Jim Thorpe in real life, and of Martin Pawley in Ford's film.

 

I always tought that Maul's name was a refference to the meaning of this name in spanish and portuguese combined.

Mau (portuguese) = Bad or evil
Mal (spanish) = Evil or wrong

 

i believe it's the english "maul" but it works either way. in english bears maul people. as in "i was mauled by a bear".

 

Yeah, it works in both ways.

 

theed - William Theed the elder - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
rey - Rey - definition of Rey by The Free Dictionary
finn - a leader of the Fenian warriors and the father of Ossian:the subject of many legends.
phasma - ghost| specter

 

Somehow I suspect "Rey" (if that is indeed the character's name) is actually a rather bad pun. Involving tigers.

 

Luke reads like a common Slavic word luk, which means ONION. if we were to look (no pun intended) for weirdness all the time, we would find a lot of it.

...

That said, when a character's name is a butchered spelling of a bunch of related names of Germanic, Latin and Slavic origin, it's pretty hard to kno what the authors wanted to communicate. *shakes fist*

 

Minch may be taken from mensch the german for human being And in yiddish it means a person of integrity and honor.

 

ATMachine

If that was Yoda's original name, he could've been known as Buffy, the Sith Slayer.

 

Minch may be taken from mensch the german for human being And in yiddish it means a person of integrity and honor.[/quote]
Well, if we're talkling about German, then Boba Fett is Boba Fat. Or is it Boba Phat?

Interesting thread, though. Many different origins for the names. My favourite still being Nute Gunray

 

I add the meanings I know:
Luke = light (from Greek "leukos"), Skywalker = who walks in the sky
Solo = alone
Padmé = lotus (from Persian language), Amidala = amigdala
Vader = father (from Dutch)
Leia (name with Hebrew origins) = meadow
Anakin (maybe from Sanskrit) = warrior
Obi = heart (from Nigerian), Wan = gentle (from Chinese), Kenobi ("ken"+"obi") -> Ken = strong (from Japanese)
Chewbacca (from Russian "sobaka") = dog
Yoda = maybe from "yoga"

I don't know if they're all true, I've only found them making resources on the web.
Anyway, I find these meanings very interesting

 

Edit: *making researches*
Sorry for double post.

 

Arabic names:

"Ackbar." Arabic for "great," as in "Allah akbar," God is great.

"Asyr Sei'lar," from the expanded universe. "Asyr" is Arabic for "juice," "seiarra" means "car."

"Garm Bel Iblis." "Iblis" being an Arabic word for the devil.

 

Garm is the hound of Hel, goddess of the underworld in Norse mythology. So "Garm Bel Iblis" apparently means something like "hound of the Devil."

PS: Celidore, I like your username. Very euphonious, as a philologist might say.

 

Thank you!

 

As somebody who studied Italian language and literature at the uni, I love it, too.

 

Some I don't think have been said:

R2-D2: Lucas saw "reel 2, dialog 2" while making THX-1138
C-3P0: Ive heard that he was originally named just C3, and based on a map reference from Lucas's hometown, of a post office (the added PO).