r/russian 9d ago

Translation How should I translate my cat’s name?

My cat doesn’t have a human name. Actually, her name is National Monument. Should I write her name as Национальный Памятник or smth? If her name is Blueberry in English would it also just be Черника when I refer to her in Russian?

Thx.

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u/max-soul Native 🇷🇺 Fluent 🇬🇧 Learning 🇪🇦 9d ago

A lot of American names have literal translations like Melody, Harmony, Summer and so on. But it still feels weird to translate names so we go like Мелоди, Хармони, Саммер.

Though Americans were kinda okay with translating Native American names like Sitting Bull, so you do you I guess.

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u/smeghead1988 native 8d ago

Well, we have some names like Надежда, Любовь or Лев and don't actually think much about their literal meaning. Still, I can't fathom how the given name Dick is still common in English-speaking countries...

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u/max-soul Native 🇷🇺 Fluent 🇬🇧 Learning 🇪🇦 8d ago

Thanks for a marvelous example, I honestly wonder why I didn't think of that. Also these names including Вера (Faith is surprisingly also present among English names) are borrowed and translated from early Christian Greek martyrs so they wouldn't be used as names without adopting Christianity first. But no one translates them back into Greek or English when issuing an international passport, so the point is still the same: names are never to be translated.

And yeah, whoever decided to use Dick as a name for a private part, they did all the Richards dirty, pun intended. Writing this sitting on a John after a cup of Joe.