. (New Zealand)
This name (if you can even call it that) would’ve been pronounced “full stop” if these New Zealand parents had gotten their way. However, the government rejected it, adding it to their list of banned baby names.
Monkey (Denmark)
Instead of having a banned baby names list, Denmark has an approved baby names list containing about 7,000 names. If you live in Denmark and want to choose a name that’s not on the list, you must get a government official’s approval. Needless to say, “Monkey” does not make the approved baby names list. But that didn’t stop a couple of Danish parents from trying.
Harriet/Duncan (Iceland)
Iceland is another nation with notoriously strict naming laws. Names in Iceland may be outlawed if they cannot be conjugated in Iceland or include letters that the Icelandic alphabet doesn’t have an equivalent for. One pair of parents learned this the hard way when they named their daughter Harriet, a name which can’t be conjugated in Icelandic. The poor parents struck out again when they named their son Duncan – the Icelandic alphabet has no equivalent for the letter C. They had to get passports for their children with the names “Girl” and “Boy” instead of their real names.
