Wednesday, July 4, 2012

Saro

Wrapping up my strange American name theme week, I'll cover a name that was introduced to me through a song.

"Saro" (pronounced "SAH-roh") is an old traditional tune. It is sung from the perspective of someone who immigrated to America. He is thankful to be alive and loves his new home, but regrets that he left a girl named Saro back where he came from. As beautiful as the song is, I couldn't help but wonder...what kind of a name is Saro?

My name senses told me that Saro was a variant of Sarah, and I was right. Of course, Sarah is a Hebrew name meaning "princess." Saro is unique to the Appallacian Mountain region, which is why many Americans have probably not heard of it before. But the song suggests that it came from another country. Irish was my first guess, but I don't remember hearing it when I was in Ireland. In any case, there is more than one American song that refers to a girl named Saro.

Girls names ending in an "o" sound have been seeing more use in recent years. I can see Saro appealing to those that love Shiloh. It has the connection to the much more traditional Sarah without actually being Sarah, and therefore could be a great way to honor someone named Sarah if you have more unique tastes. The only possible downside is that it sounds a little bit like "sorrow."

Saro is growing on me. I think it has the potential for being used more. It's a simple but alluring name for those that like traditional with a twist.

So hopefully you've enjoyed these posts and the scheduling has worked according to plan. There is another scheduled post coming up in a few days. After that, you'll just have to wait for me to come home. See you then, and enjoy Independence Day!

Sources:
http://www.babynamewizard.com/baby-name/girl/saro
http://www.thinkbabynames.com/meaning/0/Sarah

Image Credit:
http://weheartit.com

2 comments:

  1. Saro is very pretty, although I kind of like it for a boy. The connection to the song is actually quite touching.

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  2. lol Originally Saro is a guy's name... and it happens to be my name which I'm a guy. I'm not sure which song you heard this from or which country your "Saro" comes from, but it looks like there are more than one source for this name. In my case, my parents heard this name from an opera based on an Armenian poem called "Anush" written by Hovhannes Tumanyan. In this story, Anush is in love with a shepherd boy named Saro, but things go wrong between him and her brother so he ends up killing Saro out of revenge. Anush cannot bear the pain of losing him, therefore she takes her life by jumping off a cliff. Such a great character my parents named me after who ends up getting shot, I should be so grateful, lol. Since it's another tragic story resembling that of Romeo and Juliette my parents are still convinced Saro is the Armenian name for Romeo. Although I had found a site where it claims the name was shortened by the poet from the root name of "Saribek" which is Turkish for "blonde prince". Coincidentally, it was also the name of a Nigerian writer called Saro-Wiwa, so go figure. All in all, I think Saro is a simple yet creative name but the origin is ambiguous and the meaning still remains shrouded in obscurity. I still think it's better off used as a guy's name cuz the ending of "o" is known to be used for male names, and hearing Saro you'd naturally expect the person to be a guy. Not to mention, i know a few people in my city, somewhere in Canada, who are also named Saro and they're all guys, but it seems to be solely used by locals of Armenian origin. So yeah, I hope this information helps.

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