Revelation: My real name is Esther Vanhomrigh

“Vanessa” is just a pseudonym.

*evil stare*

So, here’s the story.

I was surfing around the web instead of working, and I thought it would be oh so awesome to google about the origin of my name. I already know about my surname and all, but it had never occured to me to search for my first name, Vanessa.

Here’s what I found:

Vanessa (WIkipedia):

The name Vanessa was invented by Irish writer Jonathan Swift for Esther Vanhomrigh, whom Swift had met in 1708 and whom he tutored. The name was created by taking “Van” from Vanhomrigh’s last name and adding “Essa”, the pet form of Esther.

In 1726 the name Vanessa appeared in print for the first time in Cadenus and Vanessa, an autobiographical poem about Swift’s relationship with Vanhomrigh. Swift had written the poem in 1713, but it was not published until three years after Vanhomrigh died.

There is a conjectured relationship of Swift’s invented name to that of Vannozza dei Cattanei, the mother of the famed Cesare Borgia, who had lived 200 years earlier. It means beautiful.

Vanessa has been adopted later as the name of a genus of butterfly.

Feminine.

Origin: English.

Pronunciation: va-NES-a

Meaning: butterfly in greek

Variant: Nessa, Nessie, Nessy, Van, Vanesa, Vanesse, Vanetta, Vania, Vanija, Vanna, Vannessa, Vannetta, Vannie, Vanya, Venesa, Venessa, Venetta, Vinessa, Vonessa, Vonesse and Vonnessa.

Popularity: Vanessa ranked as a very popular name on the 1990 U.S. Census, at 195 out of 4275 for females of all ages.

So, thank you Jonathan Swift, for my existence… well, of course I would have existed anyways, just named “Maria Juana” or something…

I used to hate my name anyway.