Onomastics is the mouth-filling word for the study of names, but it can be much more interesting than that forbidding Greek-derived word suggests. Take, for example, the names of pets. All across the United States, there are millions of little creatures (and some not so little) who are part of the family circle: Al (Gator), Pussy (Cat), and generations of dogs named Rover or Spot. I knew an English professor who took his dog\u27s name from Lady Macbeth\u27s famous sleep-walking scene, so that he could cry Out, out damned Spot! I\u27m an English professor, too, but my old English sheep dog is named Randall (derived from the Old English word for house wolf, as names like Ralph and Randolph derive from the Anglo-Saxon word for wolf). An earlier dog of mine was named Lady Brett, Hemingway\u27s heroine in the novel The Sun Also Rises (her surname was Ashley, too)
