Japanese Female Names 



IV 



IN the first part of this paper I suggested that the 

 custom of giving very poetical names to geisha 

 and tojoro might partly account for the unpopu 

 larity of purely esthetic yobina. And in the 

 hope of correcting certain foreign misapprehen 

 sions, I shall now venture a few remarks about 

 the names of geisha. 



Geisha-mmes, like other classes of names, 

 although full of curious interest, and often in 

 themselves really beautiful, have become hope 

 lessly vulgarized by association with a calling the 

 reverse of respectable. Strictly speaking, they 

 have nothing to do with the subject of the 

 present study, inasmuch as they are not real 

 personal names, but professional appellations only, 

 not yobina, but geimyo. 



A large proportion of such names can be dis 

 tinguished by certain prefixes or suffixes attached 

 to them. They can be known, for example, 



( 1 ) By the prefix Waka, signifying " Young " ; 



as in the names Wakagusa, " Young Grass " ; 



Waka^uru, " Young Stork " ; Wakamurasaki, 



" Young Purple " ; Wakakoma, " Young Filly ". 



