Archetypal names are proper name

Proper name

"A proper name [is] a word that answers the purpose of showing what thing it is that we are talking about" writes John Stuart Mill in A System of Logic , "but not of telling anything about it"...

s of real, mythological, or fictional characters that have become designations for archetype

Archetype

An archetype is a universally understood symbol or term or pattern of behavior, a prototype upon which others are copied, patterned, or emulated...

s of certain personal traits.

Archetypal names are a literary device used to allude to a certain traits of a character

Character (arts)

A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...

 or a plot.

Literary critic Egil Törnqvist

Egil Törnqvist

Egil Törnqvist is Professor Emeritus of Scandinavian Studies at the University of Amsterdam and an academic literary critic.Earlier he was in charge of the drama division in the comparative literatureprogram at Uppsala University.-Books:...

 mentions possible risks in choosing certain names for literary characters. For example, if a person is named Abraham

Abraham (name)

This is a list of people named after Abraham, the Biblical patriarch ; the father of the Abrahamic Religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam:...

, it is unclear whether the reader is hinted of the biblical or Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

, and only the context provides the proper understanding.

Archetypal names for persons

• Bruce
  Bruce
  The English language name Bruce arrived in Scotland with the Normans, from the place name Brix of the Manche département in Normandy, France, meaning "the willowlands"...
  
  , a male hairdresser or interior designer
• Destiny
  Destiny
  Destiny or fate refers to a predetermined course of events. It may be conceived as a predetermined future, whether in general or of an individual...
  
  , potential future
• Nanook
  Nanook
  In Inuit mythology, Nanook or Nanuq , which is from the Inuit language for polar bear, was the master of bears, meaning he decided if hunters had followed all applicable taboos and if they deserved success in hunting bears....
  
  , an Eskimo
• Tex
  Tex
  Tex may refer to:*Tex , a unit of measure for the linear mass density of fibers*TeX, pronounced "tech", a typesetting system created by Donald E...
  
  , a cowboy
• Hanako
  Hanako (given name)
  Hanako is a female Japanese given name. The name can have different meanings, one of them being 花子, "flower girl."It is often seen as an archetypal name for girls....
  
  , an archetypal Japanese name for girls.
• Jeeves
  Jeeves
  Reginald Jeeves is a fictional character in the short stories and novels of P. G. Wodehouse, being the valet of Bertie Wooster . Created in 1915, Jeeves would continue to appear in Wodehouse's works until his final, completed, novel Aunts Aren't Gentlemen in 1974, making him Wodehouse's most famous...
  
  , an archetypal name for a butler
  Butler
  A butler is a domestic worker in a large household. In great houses, the household is sometimes divided into departments with the butler in charge of the dining room, wine cellar, and pantry. Some also have charge of the entire parlour floor, and housekeepers caring for the entire house and its...
  
  .

Archetypal names for groups

A name may also be an identifier of a social group, an ethnicity, nationality

Nationality

Nationality is membership of a nation or sovereign state, usually determined by their citizenship, but sometimes by ethnicity or place of residence, or based on their sense of national identity....

, or geographical locality.

Some of the names below may also be used as ethnic slurs.

• Irishmen: Paddy, from Saint Patrick
  Saint Patrick
  Saint Patrick was a Romano-Briton and Christian missionary, who is the most generally recognized patron saint of Ireland or the Apostle of Ireland, although Brigid of Kildare and Colmcille are also formally patron saints....
  
  , the patron of Ireland

See also

• Stock character
  Stock character
  A Stock character is a fictional character based on a common literary or social stereotype. Stock characters rely heavily on cultural types or names for their personality, manner of speech, and other characteristics. In their most general form, stock characters are related to literary archetypes,...
  
  
• Placeholder name
  Placeholder name
  Placeholder names are words that can refer to objects or people whose names are either temporarily forgotten, irrelevant, or unknown in the context in which they are being discussed...
  
  
• Eponym
  Eponym
  An eponym is the name of a person or thing, whether real or fictitious, after which a particular place, tribe, era, discovery, or other item is named or thought to be named...
  
  
• :Category:National personifications
• List of eponyms