"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet."

So said Shakespeare, but of course there is much which lies behind a name. For example, the Society of Kabalarians draws on over 70 years of research and experience in providing name analyses, and claims that their analysis offer invaluable benefit to people in understanding their strengths and weaknesses both mentally and physically. 

Except in South Korea, some 20 million people share just five surnames. Every one of Denmark’s top 20 surnames ends in ‘-sen’, meaning ‘son of’, a pattern that is replicated across Scandinavia. British surnames have never favoured such neatness, and we can be grateful for that. While we may have lost such delightfully chewy names as Crackpot, Crookbones and Sweteinbede, the average city will still provide its Slys, Haythornthwaites, and McGillikuddys. 
McKie’s  (What's in a Surname?: A Journey from Abercrombie to Zwicker) book  is filled with the stories of real individuals: the powerful families whose forebears crossed the channel in 1066 — among them the Sinclairs, Nevilles and D’Arcys — as well as those who lived for their names and frequently died for them. Around a third of William’s conquering army were Flemings, a name meaning someone from Flanders and traditionally associated with trade and entrepreneurship. When English merchants began to resent the new competition, the results were dramatic — McKie relates how many of the Flemings who had settled in London were hunted down by mobs and forced to speak such words as ‘bread and cheese’. If their response sounded like ‘brod’ and ‘caisse’ they would be set upon and slaughtered.
In the 17th century, surnames were harnessed to more peaceful, but no less manipulative, ends. Under the influence of the Puritans, the practice arose of baptising children with scriptural or pious phrases annexed to their last name. Hence there are church records of such names as Preserved Fish, Thankful Thorpe, Repentance Water, Kill-sin Pimple, and Humiliation Hinde. Conversely, other surnames of the period offer unflinchingly pithy descriptions of the condition of the bearer, including Blackinthemouth, Blubber, Mad, Measle, Peckcheese, and Hatechrist.
Many such examples would have begun as nicknames, a significant category in the origin of surnames. Gyldenbollockes was a popular name on the streets of medieval England, centuries before David Beckham, while others such as Thynne and Belcher speak for themselves. And yet in all such cases, McKie is rightly keen to emphasise the rarity of an easy answer. The ancestors of anyone called Brown today may have traditionally worn brown cloth, but they may also have been of swarthy complexion; similarly, the surname Stout may have begun as the result of medieval humour and an epithet for one who was notably skinny.
Nonetheless, the importance of such nicknames must not be underestimated: not only are they the source of a great number of British surnames, they also provide dictionary-makers with important evidence of a word’s early use. 
The perspective of McKie’s study is an ambitious one. He takes in surnames from fiction (Murtlock suggests murder, while Bagshaws tend to wear ill-fitting corduroys), those from myth and legend (including Rumplestiltskin, who is safe only for as long as his name remains undiscovered), and some important ones from today whose meanings would surprise us all. If we were to judge a politician by their surname, David Cameron would have a crooked nose, George Osborne would be a divine bear, and Chris Huhne a bogeyman.

More recently,  a Tennessee judge argued that a baby's name can affect his life profoundly. So he reasoned that the name of a seven month old called Messiah needed to be changed: a name that the judge argued would have put him “at odds with a lot of people” in his mainly Christian home county.
"Your name can influence the assumptions that other people make about your character and background, and thus the chances you are given in life," says Richard Wiseman -- a case in point, he's a professor of psychology at the University of Hertfordshire.

"It can also be a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. If your name sounds intelligent, successful and attractive, you are more likely to act those things." A flurry of studies in recent years have examined names as predictors of success.
Research has pointed to a clear, though probably subconscious, tendency for people to prefer things that resemble themselves -- including the letters of their names. Thus Denises are more likely to become dentists than dermatologists, while Lawrences are overrepresented among lawyers and Raymonds among radiologists.

There is even a Latin proverb for the phenomenon: Nomen est omen -- and the examples are bountiful:

- Racing driver Scott Speed,
- TV gardening presenter Bob Flowerdew,
- Singer Bill Medley,
- Golfer Tiger Woods,
- Poet William Wordsworth,
- Former White House spokesman Larry Speakes, and
- Sue Yoo, a lawyer.

There are many ironic examples as well: former Archbishop of Manila Cardinal (Jaime) Sin, pain relief expert Dr Richard Payne and the British urologist Nicolas Burns-Cox.

So be careful when you name your children!