Naming a Prince: What Will We Call Will and Kate's Baby?

And now, we get to the boys' names.  Based on almost all of the press coverage, it seems the odds are that the child is a girl, but were it to be a boy, these are the Top 10 (I took a judgment call on the final slot).

1. George

Source: George is about as common of a name as you can get in British royal circles.  There have been thus far six kings that sport the name, including Queen Elizabeth II’s father and grandfather, and the rumor is that Prince Charles will forego being called King Charles III in favor of being King George VII.

Pro: There’s a great amount of goodwill surrounding the name.  King George VI was universally popular during World War II, and this would be a great way to honor the Queen, who was quite fond of her father.

Con: It’s a bit old-fashioned, obviously, and not all of the Georges were created equally.  King George V’s son George, the Duke of Kent, was a notorious playboy who had a number of affairs with well-known personalities (the rumors spread as vastly as Barbara Cartland, Jessie Matthews, Noel Coward, and Prince Ferdinand of Prussia).  He was also potentially the father of a number of people out of wedlock, including Michael Canfield, Lee Radziwill’s first husband.

2. James

Source: James has been the name of two British monarchs, as well as seven Scottish kings, most recently James II of England (a seventeenth century king).  Kate Middleton’s younger brother is also named James, as is Princess Diana's great-grandfather.

Pro: It’s a name steeped in both English and Scottish tradition, which is a good thing for British unity as the Scottish independence movement remains strong.

Con: The biggest one is that Will’s cousin is also named James (the Viscount Severn, or depending on how you handle the Letters Patent debate that surround the Earl of Wessex’s children, HRH Prince James, The Viscount Severn, and yes, I side with the latter).  There is also the fact that King James II did not get along well with Parliament (there’s a reason they stopped using his name for a number of years.  Additionally, Jacobitism, a period when there was a struggle with Hanoverians (the current British dynasty) and the Stuarts (the previous dynasty), started with James Francis Edward Stuart, so there’s a bit of a sting to the current monarchs.

3. Andrew

Source: There has oddly not been a King Andrew in Britain (Hungary has had several), so this will be based on two Princes that are closely related to Prince William.  First, there is his uncle, Prince Andrew, the Duke of York, the younger brother of Prince Charles.  Secondly, there is William’s great-grandfather, the father of Prince Philip, Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark.  Andrew is also an exceedingly common middle name in the royal family.

Pro: It’s classic, but not entirely dated.  The name has risen in prominence within the Royal Family in recent years.

Con: The Duke of York is hardly a royal that one would want to emulate (he has courted controversy, along with his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, for most of his adult life), and Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark's reputation has not enjoyed the sterling nature that his wife Princess Alice’s has.

4. Arthur

Source: Obviously, the most famous Arthur was one that may never have existed, and sailed off centuries ago into Avalon.  In addition, Queen Victoria had a son who was named Prince Arthur, who was Duke of Connaught and Strathearn (her last living son), and he had a son named Arthur who was Governor-General of South Africa in the 1920’s.  Also, Arthur is one of Prince William’s three middle names.

Pro: Though history has long debated whether Arthur was indeed a real person (much less a king), there is little doubt that his name has great reverence within the canons of both British myth and literature.  We still allude to Camelot when we refer to everyone from the Kennedys to the Obamas in America, and the world likely views Kate and Will in a similar way.

Con: Being the first undisputed King Arthur would be a major burden to place onto a child.

5. Harold

Source: You’d have to go back quite a ways, but Harold was indeed the name of two British kings.  The last one was the man who lost the Battle of Hastings, Harold II, who died in 1066.  Modern uses of the name are considerably sparser (Harald V, the King of Norway, is a second cousin of Queen Elizabeth II through his grandmother Princess Maud of Wales, but that’s about it).

Pro: It’s definitely unusual, and would give British historians something to crow about (this time a Harold succeeding a William instead of vice versa a century ago).

Con: Little Baby Harold?  Seriously?

6. John

Source: I’m clearly partial to this one, though the only British monarch that sported the name was King John, generally considered one of the Britain’s worst kings.  Kate Middleton has three great-great grandfathers who sported the name, and John is the name of William’s grandfather (on Diana’s side), which is likely the source of this name in the press.

Pro: This is probably the best way that William could pay homage to his mother if the child is a boy and still stick to a name that is common with the British monarchy.

Con: John is a fairly cursed name in the British family.  In addition to King John, there’s John of Gaunt, perhaps the most significant man in the British Royal Family that never managed to take the throne, and most recently, Prince John, Queen Elizabeth’s young uncle who died at age thirteen from a seizure.

7. Joseph

Source: While Portugal and Spain have had leaders named Joseph, Britain has not.  The only person I can find in recent memory that has a clear blood connection to the British Royal Family with this name is a young prince of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha who was born in Brazil and died at age nineteen (he would be a third cousin of King George V).  I can find no connections in the Middleton or Spencer families to the name (if you know any that I’m missing, share in the comments).

Pro: It’s definitely a unique name, and one that would standout (who wouldn’t want a Prince Joe?)

Con: It has so little to do with the Royal Family, unless I’m missing something, it seems really unusual  that they would go so out of the box.

8. Louis

Source: There’s no shortage of King Louis’s (France has roughly twenty of them, depending on how you count some of the later ones), but your best bet to find a direction to Will and Kate is through Prince Louis of Battenburg, who was the grandfather of Prince Philip (and he also married a granddaughter of Queen Victoria).  In addition to this, one of William’s middle names is Louis. 

Pro: This is another way to honor Prince Philip.  There seems to be quite an assumption that any male children would be honoring the Duke of Edinburgh, whom Prince William is very close with, and so this seems like a plausible guess.

Con: Louis is so completely associated with the French monarchy, it’s hard to believe they’d go this route.

9. Philip

Source: Prince Philip is obviously the inspiration for this, as he is Prince William’s grandfather, and as we just mentioned, a favorite of the Duke of Cambridge’s.   Philip is also the final of William’s three middle names.

Pro: This is a great way to honor the Royal Family’s current patriarch, and it’s a name that has been added with great gusto to the Royal Family lexicon since the Queen married the Greek prince.

Con: It’s a bit on-the-nose, isn’t it?  I mean, despite it’s spot at ninth place, wouldn’t we all assume this is the name they’d go with?  I’m betting they want to get outside the box.

10. Charles

Source: This is actually in a three-way tie with Richard and Benjamin, but the former doesn’t seem likely and the latter seems a bit out-of-nowhere.  So I’ll go with Charles, which is of course the name of Prince William’s father, and the next monarch of England.  It's also the name of Princess Diana's younger brother.  In addition, this is one of Prince Harry’s middle names, and as the princes are quite close, would be a way for Will and Kate to honor the “spare heir.”

Pro: Charles is a very traditional name in the monarchy, and this would be a wonderful way to pay tribute to William's father.  Naming a child after a father or grandfather is very common in the Royal Family.
Con: This doesn't seem as in-fashion these days as it was a hundred years ago, and there's a lot of bad will with the previous two King Charles.

And Finally, One More Name I'm Surprised Isn't In the Mix...Albert

Source: The name I’m most stunned they’re missing is Albert.  The connotations are pretty obvious-Prince Albert was a well-loved spouse of Queen Victoria, and therefore the ancestor of every blood member of the Royal Family.  In addition, Albert is one of Prince Harry’s middle names.

Pro: Though Britain has yet to have a King Albert, it may be the most common name to not get to the throne, at least in the last few centuries.

Con: Do you have Prince Albert in a can?