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Is the family name of Neville a funny one that is actually part of the his "image" in the first books?

I'm asking this from the point of view of a non-British and a non-English native speaker.

Another form of this question would be - is Longbottom a name that you rather not give to your children if you can avoid it.

vap78
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    Longbottom is the family name, and Neville is his given name. Longbottom wouldn't be "given" to him. Neville was given to him, and Longbottom was the family name. In British culture, your family name is always the last one listed. – thorkia Apr 08 '15 at 20:30
  • @thotkia that is only partially true. One has two parents i.e. two family names to choose from. Some cultures find it pretty acceptable to use either of the names for your family name. – vap78 Apr 08 '15 at 20:34
  • In British culture you have only one family name - that of your father. Sometimes parents choose hyphenate it (mother-father), but the tradition is to only use the fathers family name for the children – thorkia Apr 08 '15 at 20:35
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    Additionally, Longbottom is not a name JKR invented, it has been in use in England for a long time. http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Longbottom – Jack B Nimble Apr 08 '15 at 20:35
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    Also, most of the traditional and common family/last names used in British culture are based on things people did to support a family, or where they lived (for nobility and wealthy people). Harry Potter - potter is the family name. This name would have indicate at some point his ancestors were potters. – thorkia Apr 08 '15 at 20:37
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    @thorkia Like Abbot, Archer, Baker, Butcher, Butler, Carpenter, Carter, Cooper, Driver, Farmer, Fletcher, Fuller, Hunter, Mason, Miller, Page, Shepherd, Smith, Tanner, Thatcher, Walker, Ward, Weaver, Wheeler, etc.? – KSmarts Apr 08 '15 at 20:49
  • @JackBNimble - oups. I posted my answer then noticed your comment. If you prefer to make your own asnwer from that link, I'll delete mine – DVK-on-Ahch-To Apr 08 '15 at 20:50
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    Longbottom is a real surname that can be encountered in Britain. It just has the unfortunate feature of the only notable citation found person to bear it being from Harry Potter. – TZHX Apr 08 '15 at 20:50
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    This question is attracting close votes as is (including mine) but if it could be re-worded (e.g. "Did JKR invent the name Longbottom, perhaps as a joke name?") it would be a good question. – Null Apr 08 '15 at 20:56
  • @DVK, as you wish. – Jack B Nimble Apr 08 '15 at 21:00
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    I am rather disheartened at the downvotes for a self-professed non-English speaker who is attempting to understand a nuance of how the language is natively received. – Lexible Apr 08 '15 at 22:54
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    Maybe this would be better off at ELL.SE? Or edited as @Null says to make it more SFFy. – Rand al'Thor Apr 08 '15 at 23:51
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    @randal'thor - the downvotes are because as asked, the question is highly subjective (as you can see from the fact that Richard posted an answer "funny" and I posted the answer "not funny" - based on same exact data. I would gladly reverse BOTH my downvote AND my VTC if the question is edited as Null suggested above – DVK-on-Ahch-To Apr 09 '15 at 00:02
  • @randal'thor - not really. Good citizenship, even :) – DVK-on-Ahch-To Apr 09 '15 at 01:09
  • I reworded the question to make it more clear what the main idea of the question is. Thanks everyone for the nice research. I'm inclined to believe Richard who is British and understands this a much better :). BTW - he did not use the same source like DVK and Jack B Nimble - his source is something from JKR. – vap78 Apr 09 '15 at 07:08
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    +1 In Italy Neville's surname is translated "Paciocc", from pacioccone: "a fat or chubby person with a friendly, kind and peaceful character". It's always used as a positive adjective and fits Neville quite well. I was wondering, like vap78, if Longbottom has a similar meaning or is in any way linked to Neville's character. – algiogia Oct 01 '15 at 08:05

5 Answers5

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First off, JKR never came out and stated either way. So we can only infer. I'm inferring that she didn't intend the name to make fun of the character.

First, generic evidence - most of her names that are meant to convey meanings are NOT meant to make fun of someone (except for "looney" Luna's first name, possibly) or otherwise hurtful. Nearly all the meaningful names (Lupin, Weasley, Newt Salamander, Voldemort, Lovegood, Poppy, Ollievander, etc...) had real non-insulting meaning, either in-universe or out of universe. So, naming Neville with a deeply insulting name intentionally would have been out of pattern.

Leaving that aside, we have evidence from the name itself:

  1. t's a real English surname, with fairly non-funny and non-insulting meaning/origins.

    This interesting name is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and is a topographical surname for someone who lived in a long valley or dell. In some cases the modern surname, found as Longbottom and Longbotham, may also be locational in origin, from the place called "Longbottom" in Luddended Foot in West Yorkshire. In either instance the name derives from the Old English pre 7th Century "lang", Middle English "long", long, with Old English "bothm, botm", Middle English "bodme", bottom, valley, dell.

    The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Richard Longboteham, which was dated 1379, in the "Yorkshire Poll Tax Returns", during the reign of King Richard 11, known as "Richard of Bordeaux", 1377 - 1399.

    Source: http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Longbottom

  2. Please note that the fact that JKR intended it to be a topographical meaning of the name is even more likely considering that his first (given) name is ALSO topographical:

    This great and noble surname is of Norman origin, introduced into England after the Conquest of 1066. It is a French locational name from "Neuville" in Calvados or "Neville" in Seine-Maritime, Normandy, both so called from the Old French "neu(f)" new, with "ville", a settlement (src: http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Neville)

  3. So, for that matter, was another earlier version of Neville's surname (from the First Forty document referenced in @Richard's answer):

    ... either a locational surname, from a place called Sidebottom in Cheshire near Stockport, or a topographical name peculiar to the counties of Cheshire, Lancashire and Yorkshire. The derivation of the name is from the Olde English pre 7th Century "sid", wide, broad, spacious, and "bothm", valley, bottom, dell, and in the case of the topographical surname, this would denote residence in such a "wide valley". (src: http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Sidebottom)

  4. An interesting contradiction is that, on the same First Forty document, Neville also had another rejected version of surname, Puff. That one doesn't seem to have much of topographic origin, and isn't even British or French. The only known origins are German/Austrian:

    nickname for a violent, aggressive person, from buff ‘push’, ‘shove’. From a pet form of a personal name, Bodefrit, composed with Old High German biutan ‘to bid or order’ or boto ‘messenger’. Possibly an altered spelling of Pfaff.

    If that's the meaning, I can see where JKR was coming from crossing that name out :)

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DVK-on-Ahch-To
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  • Widebottom would be an even funnier name. – Valorum Apr 09 '15 at 11:33
  • You seem to have missed the fact that she likely chose 'Neville' because it's also a quite an amusing name. – Valorum Apr 09 '15 at 11:41
  • @Richard - explain please? – DVK-on-Ahch-To Apr 09 '15 at 16:42
  • It's generally seen as a very weak, drippy sort of a name. It's far more likely that that's why she chose it rather than its association with the French derivative. – Valorum Apr 09 '15 at 17:41
  • @Richard - I didn't know names can be "drippy" :) – DVK-on-Ahch-To Apr 09 '15 at 17:50
  • "Weak or ineffectual", which pretty much describes his character, at least early on in the books. – Valorum Apr 09 '15 at 18:15
  • @DVK - the negative associations with the name "Neville" are almost certainly due to the actions of Neville Chamberlain, the Prime Minister of Britain in the late 1930s, whose appeasement policies are widely seen as encouraging Hitler's aggressive tendencies by convincing him that Britain would do nothing to resist Germany's actions. His refusal to oppose Hitler's early actions (based on the British national trauma of WWI) is widely seen as a major contribution to the onset of WWII. – WhatRoughBeast Apr 09 '15 at 18:28
  • @Richard - remember the whole "it takes an even greater courage to stand up to your friends" from Book 1? :) Not exactly "weak". For more detail: http://scifi.stackexchange.com/a/3716/976 – DVK-on-Ahch-To Apr 09 '15 at 18:38
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I think we can be pretty certain that JKR's intention was to make Neville sound a bit "goofy" with her choice of name. Longbottom certainly isn't the most dignified of names, despite it being a traditionally English surname.

Note also that HP is a children's book. Names that contain the word 'bottom' are generally considered hilarious.

On top of that, the "first forty" document (showing her initial thoughts on character names) listed him originally as Neville Sidebottom, another slightly unusual British name and one that is, to some quite amusing. Obviously she had bottoms in mind when choosing his name.

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Valorum
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It is a real name, not something JKR made up, and it has been used in England for a long time.

This interesting name is of Anglo-Saxon origin, and is a topographical surname for someone who lived in a long valley or dell. In some cases the modern surname, found as Longbottom and Longbotham, may also be locational in origin, from the place called "Longbottom" in Luddended Foot in West Yorkshire. In either instance the name derives from the Old English pre 7th Century "lang", Middle English "long", long, with Old English "bothm, botm", Middle English "bodme", bottom, valley, dell.

The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Richard Longboteham, which was dated 1379, in the "Yorkshire Poll Tax Returns", during the reign of King Richard 11, known as "Richard of Bordeaux", 1377 - 1399.

Source: http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Longbottom

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Jack B Nimble
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My last name actually is Longbottom, just to confirm it is definitely a name which is still around today. A lot of Neville Longbottom jokes are a burden of the name.

Anon
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Yes. Fact: "Longbottom" is a funny name. Maybe not the funniest name possible ( like "Hugh Morris" for example ) but there is undeniably a little bit of humor in this particular choice of names. And if you can remember back to being the age/maturity of the target audience of the book I think you'll remember snickering and giggling about all things "fanny", "bottom", "butt".

David Eugene Pratt
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    British people wouldn't say fanny or butt. The word fanny is considerably taboo whereas butt is just American – Valorum Apr 09 '15 at 18:36