We’ve all heard of Alexander the Great, William the Conqueror, or Suleiman the Magnificent. Who wouldn’t want to be known to history by such flattering names? But among the many kings, princes, barons and otherwise leaders, there are a few names a bit less splendiferous.
Alexander the Great; William the Conqueror; Suleiman the Magnificent
Every literate English speaker has probably heard of Ethelred the Unready, but what about Ivar the Boneless? We think of the third Julian Roman emperor as Caligula, although his actual name was Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus. “Caligula” was a less-than-laudatory nickname which actually means “little boots,” because when he was a boy, he tried wearing a real soldiers footware and the troopers made fun of him by calling him Little Boots, or “Bootsie.”
But the list of unflattering cognomens, sobriquets and nicknames is really quite long. Not everyone was the Sun King. There was also Sebastian the Asleep of Portugal, who reigned from 1554 to 1578. And Barefoot Magnus III of Norway (1073-1103). Or Johann Georg the Beer Jug, Elector of Saxony from 1611 to 1656. As you might have surmised, he loved to bend his elbow.
Alfonso the Leper; Ivaylo the Cabbage; Piero the Gouty
None of these men seem to have had press agents spinning their boss’ reputations. Richard I may have been Lion-Hearted, but the Third was Richard Crookback. Ivaylo the Cabbage ruled Bulgaria in the 13th century. The grandson of Barefoot Magnus ruled Norway from 1130 to 1135 as Magnus the Blind. Vasili Kosoi ruled Moscow in the 15th century as Vasili the Cross-eyed. And, of course, Charles the Bald, or Charles II of France, who apparently had a full head of hair.
Physical debility seems to have been popular. William the One-Eyed of Meissen; Peter the Stutterer of Portugal; Sverker the Clubfoot of Sweden; Piero the Gouty of Florence; Alfonso the Leper of Portugal. Eric XI of Sweden (1216-1250) was called Eric the Lisp and Lame.
The most famous was probably Timur the Lame, who conquered much of the world and best known as Tamerlane. And don’t forget Uros the Weak of Serbia. Or Wilfred the Hairy of Catalonia.
Wilfred the Hairy; Ethelred the Unready; Halfdan the Bad Entertainer
The 1100s featured Bolesłav the Curly in Poland, Conan the Fat in Brittany, and Ragnvald Roundhead in Sweden.
John the Posthumus was born in France in 1316 after his father’s death and so was born a king already. He lived only a few days, and so was king from birth to death.
In AD741 Constantine was born in Byzantium and when he was baptized, the infant defecated in the baptismal font and so became ever after Emperor Constantine the Dung Named.
Sancho the Populator was king of Portugal in the 13th century (that nation seems to get a lot of these names). He had 20 children, both legitimate and otherwise. But he is beat out by John the Babymaker of the Holy Roman Empire in the 16th century, who had 63 illegitimate kids. Something for Elon Musk to aim for, I guess.
On the other hand, there was Henry the Impotent of Castile in the 15th C. and nasty old King John of England was called John Soft-Sword.
Louis Do-Nothing; Louis the Unavoidable; James the Shit
England has had its share of names, some glorious, like Elizabeth I as Gloriana, but otherwise, there was George IV, known as the Prince of Whales because of his obesity, and George III, known as derisively as Farmer George for his less-than-regal interest in agriculture. And James II was known in Ireland as Seamus as Chaca or “James the Shit” for his treatment of that country.
I love encountering these historical names. Constantius the Pale was Roman emperor. Stupid Willy was Wilhelm I of Germany. Louis Do-Nothing was Louis V of France. Germany had Wenceslaus the Drunkard. And Portugal (again) had Manuel I, the Grocer-King.
Coloman the Bookish ruled Hungary in the 12th century and Ivan I of Russia was Ivan Moneybags. And King Ludwig of Bavaria was Mad King Ludwig. And while Vlad Tepec is remembered to history as “Vlad the Impaler” and the model for Dracula, Besarab IV gained the throne of Wallachia with Vlad’s help and was then known as Besarab Tepalus, or “The Little Impaler.”
Then, there’s Alfonso the Slobberer, King of Galicia from 1188-1230, who foamed at the mouth when angered. And Eystein Halfdansson, an 8th century Norwegian king known as Eystein the Fart. Eystein’s son was known as Halfdan the Bad Entertainer — couldn’t throw a decent party. Another Norwegian king, from the 13th century was Haakon the Crazy. King Harald I of Norway from 1454 to 1474 had several names. He was Harald Fairhair, but that may have been meant ironically, since he was also Harald Tanglehair, Harald Shockhead and Harald the Lousy.
Harald Tanglehair, aka Harald the Lousy
Finally, Eric II of Denmark was Eric the Memorable but doesn’t seem to have done anything of note in his short four-year reign, at least not that anyone can remember.
These are just a few epithets and sobriquets. Wikipedia lists more than 200 historical figures once named as “The Great,” From Abbas the Great of Iran (1587-1629) to Zayn al-Abadin the Great, Sultan of Kashmir (1418-1470). Alexander the Great wasn’t called that until the Roman playwright Plautus named him that in a play, Mostellaria, in the Third Century BCE. He was also known, in Persia as Iskander the Accursed.
A list of monarchs by nickname in Wikipedia contains a thousand entries, some quite familiar, like Ivan the Terrible, some more obscure, such as Piero the Gouty of Florence, Italy.
Constantine Dung-Named; Childeric the Idiot; Ferdinand the Bomb
Some have more than one alternate identity. Napoleon Bonaparte had at least 21, including L’Aiglon (The Eagle), Le Petit Caporal (The Little Corporal), The Corsican, The Gunner of Toulon, Little Boney, and more. Most of them authored by his enemies, who seemed hesitant to pronounce his actual name. And so: The Nightmare of Europe, the Corsican Ogre, The Devil’s Favorite, The Fiend of Europe (or just, The Fiend). The British seemed to hate and fear Nappy the most and never seemed to run out of insulting names for the man.
Superstition about saying certain names out loud have given us many of these. Avoiding the name of the Devil has given us a bunch of folktale cognomens: Old Scratch, Old Nick, The Evil One Split-Foot, Father of Lies, Green-horned Monster, Jimmy Square-Foot, Old Adam, Tail-N-Horns, the Wicked One, Rule of Demons.
Which brings us to Donald John Trump. No one recently has accrued so many alternate cognomens, epithets or sobriquets. One single website lists 409 of them. Nixon might have been Tricky Dick and Clinton was Slick Willy, but no one before has had them delivered by the truckload. I stopped looking after about 800 of them. (I’m not going to list them all — I haven’t the heart). Everyone has their favorites.
They fall into several vast categories: His lying; his heft; his thin skin; his greed and self-dealing; his tweeting; his name-calling; his business failures; his sexual predation; his fascism; his failing mental powers; his word salad — the list goes on. And let’s not forget his orange hue or his hair, or his too-long ties, his golf cheating, or his bragging or the garish bad taste of a tinpot dictator. He makes it easy.
In his first term I began calling him — Moose-a-Loony. It’s almost a party game to make up new to call him. It’s fun; try it. Orange Foolius. (Although younger readers might not know where that one comes from.) Large-mouth Ass. Keep it going. Your turn.
Among my favorites: Trumplethinskin: Trumpster Fire; Mango Mussolini; Cheat-O; Tangerine Palpatine; Mar-a-Lardo; Captain Bonespur; Hair Furor; Prima Donald; Assaulter-in-Chief; Boss Tweet; Deadbeat Donald; the Lyin’ King; The Man of Steal; Forrest Trump; Donny Dementia. Use these and no one needs to be told who you are referring to. The Creature from the Orange Lagoon.
Everyone who wants is free to invent more of them. Late night talk show hosts seem to come up with new ones each night for a good laugh.
Stephen Colbert called him the Orange Manatee; John Oliver said he was Rome Burning in Man Form; Seth Meyers dubbed him Creep Throat; Jon Stewart said he was a Decomposing Jack-O-Lantern. Samantha Bee called him a Screaming Carrot Demon, and also America’s Burst Appendix. Trevor Noah said he was a Pile of Old Garbage Covered in Vodka Sauce (although I would have thought “ketchup” more apt).
The characterization that seems to have gotten under the Tangerine-Tinted Trashcan Fire (S. Bee) more than any other was delivered almost 40 years ago in 1988 when Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter called him a “short-fingered vulgarian.”
Carter said that he made the comment “just to drive him a little bit crazy.” And according to Carter, it still does.
“To this day, I receive the occasional envelope from Trump. There is always a photo of him — generally a tear sheet from a magazine. On all of them he has circled his hand in gold Sharpie in a valiant effort to highlight the length of his fingers,” Carter said. “I almost feel sorry for the poor fellow because, to me, the fingers still look abnormally stubby.”
But whether his fingers are abnormally short or not, there is no question he is a vulgarian. Every time DJT opens his pie-hole he demonstrates how little class he possesses. “Quiet, Piggy!”
And so, we keep renaming the Yam-colored Yammerer, as if we don’t want to have to say his name.
A linguist named Jenny Lederer said, “people feel like not repeating his name is [a way of] not speaking to the brand and the value system that goes along with his political ideology.”
Even a mention of his name is a problem, with a kind of folk-magic power, causing many of us to avoid it. Tweets will spell the name “Tr*mp,” like it’s a four-letter profanity, although that doesn’t really hide the name, but it does make the Tweet unsearchable by the keyword, “Trump,” and so limits its spread. And the asterisk implies that his name is vulgar, like the the dirty words censored in old books.
One is left to wonder what posterity (if there is posterity) will finally settle on as the epithet for “He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.”
We have Old Hickory, Honest Abe, Silent Cal, the Gipper, Bubba and Dubya — but how will we ever choose from the superfluity of imprecations swirling around Trump as he circles the drain?
Richard Nilsen 