What`s his name?

[Friedrich]

Robinson Crusoe has always been one of my favourites, but when working on a new adaptation for German readers I stumbled in the very first paragraph.

"I was born in the year 1632, in the city of York, of a good family,though not of that country, my father being a foreigner of Bremen, who settled first at Hull. He got a good estate by merchandise, and leaving off his trade, lived afterwards at York, from whence he had married my mother, whose relations were named Robinson, a very good family in that country, and from whom I was called Robinson Kreutznaer; but, by the usual corruption of words in England, we are now called—nay we call
ourselves and write our name—Crusoe; and so my companions always called me."

Now for the whole of my reading period ignoring this paragraph I have always taken Robinson as the Christian and Crusoe as the family name and all comments on the novel that I could get hold of on the internet seem to share this view. Now if I read this paragraph correctly, Robinson (name of his mother's family) and Kreutznaer (father's name) form the family name (like Stephan-Kühn or rather Kühn-Stephan) . If this assumption is correct the two brothers of the narrator, who are mentioned in the following paragraph, would also have been Robinson Kreutznaers. In that case what the hell is the narrator's Christian name? I have checked the whole text, In chapter 1 he is once addressed by the comrade who enticed him to his first sea voyage as "Bob" and later on, when he is in feverish dreams on his island, his parrot addresses him as "Robin". On the ship he is addressed as "Robinson" by the Captain. It is of course possible that this is an analogy to the address "Miller" or "Baker" or "Johnson" in the army. It seems very unlikely that the hero was christened Bob or Robin Robinson Kreutznaer. What do you feel? Do you take Robinson as the Christian name (although Wikipedia only knows it as a family name)? Can can you solve my dilemma (provided it really is one and I have made it clear) in any other way?

And I have yet another dilemma. "Kreutznaer" is not really a German name. "Kreuzer" however is quite common (and several translators have changed it into that in their German text.) In any way German "eu" would be pronounced as [oi] like in English "void". I see no plausible way that would lead to "Crusoe" from here. On the other hand there is feudal in English. Can I assume that the name Kreuzer could have been pronounced and heard like [kru:sne] in England so that the outcome was "Crusoe"?

[kev67]

I think I can help you there. There was a practice of parents using the mother's maiden name as a Christian name, particularly in more upper middleclass families. I am not sure if there is not still a bit of trend for it still. For example, Benedict Cumberbatch could just as easily be named Cumberbatch Benedict. I once had a colleague whose full name escapes me at the moment, but it took me a while to memorize which was his first name and which was his surname. Actually, I think the more usual practice was to give a child the mother's maiden name as a middle name, but often the child's first name would be the same as a parent's. I think the practice was more common among boys' names than girls', but I am not certain. The Brontës give good examples of this. Their brother was named Patrick Branwell Brontë. Patrick was his father's name, so he was called Branwell, which was his mother's maiden name. In Jane Eyre, Mr Rochester's full name was Edward Fairfax Rochester. iirc, Mrs Fairfax, the housekeeper was one of his poor relations. When the Brontë sisters were inventing pseudonymns for themselves, they chose Currer, Acton and Elton Bell. The first names sound male, but they are not actually common first names; they are surnames used as first names.

I wondered slightly how Kreutsnaer would corrupt to Crusoe. I am not even sure whether Kreuzer would corrupt to Crusoe. I would have Croyser would be a more likely corruption.

Edit: My colleague's name was Piers Bertrand. This was confusing to me because there was a famous philosopher and logician called Bertrand Russell. Bertrand Russell could just as easily be Russell Bertrand. Likewise the newspaper editor Piers Morgan. I know someone called Morgan.

[Eiseabhal]

It's obviously his first name. I don't see the problem. And the essential idea of Kreutznaer changing to Crusoe is that it was "corrupted".

[Jackson Richardson]

I think I can help you there. There was a practice of parents using the mother's maiden name as a Christian name

Firzwilliam Darcy. (His mother was Lady Anne Fitzwilliam.)

[Jackson Richardson]

Clive, Stuart and Wesley are all examples of family names used as first names.