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Margaret doesn't sound American at all to me. I think it's always been more popular in Britain. At any rate, it was *extremely* popular in Scotland in my grandmother's generation. (Because Princess Margaret was the first royal baby to be born north of the border in however long.) It's very seldom used for babies now.

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I like Meg and Peggy as nicknames, but I'm not fond of Margaret at all. I think it sounds harsh, and very dated.

I had both an aunt and a cousin named Margaret.(Cousin was named for aunt.)Neither was ever nick-named.

I love it and don't think it has any geographic association. It's not common at all where I am.

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My favorite nicknames are Maisie and Daisy. I absolutely loathe Maggie.

I'm American...

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But I love the name. It's not too popular in my area, and I love Meg. I would use Margaret quite easily, and may very well do so. It's a lovely, classic name with so many wonderful, wonderful namesakes.

I like Margaret, dont' think ti sounds too American. It's not common where I live especially not for children. My favourite nickname for Margaret is Maggie.

- I adore the name Margaret, I love its beauty and the multitude of nicknames, I just love it.

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- It doesn't sound to American to me. If I were to peg it as too _____ it would be too Catholic.

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- It isn't all that common in my area (North Carolina) but I've noticed at events for the Roman Catholic Diocese it seems popular.

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- I would say Maggie but I also love Meg, Greta amd Gretel

I adore Margaret, actually. It's so lovely in full that I wouldm't use a nickname, but if I did it would be Meg or Daisy. It's not common at all where I live, especially on children. I've met only two, one was my grandmum and the other was an exes' mum.

What do you think of this name? I like it, but I don't love it. Margaret's short forms and variations are more attractive to me than Margaret itself.

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Does it sound too American? Not at all. It's a classic English name, so it's equally at home in any english speaking country.

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Is it common where you live? Among children, it's not common, but it's not especially rare either. I've met one or two. I've never known a Margaret my own age. It's the most common among the 45+ crowd.

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What's your favourite of its nicknames? I love so many: Meg, Maggie, Maisie, Mae, Rita. Margot, Daisy, Marjorie, Greta, and Gretchen all started as diminutives of Margaret, but I would use them as names on their own instead of nicknames. For my own child, I'd probably use one of these instead of Margaret.

I love Margaret. It's my favorite girl's name. We were going to name our baby Margaret if he was a girl. So hopefully one day he'll have a sister named Margaret.

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I don't think of it as American at all.

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It is somewhat common where I live on people of all different ages.

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The nickname we would have used is Maggie, but I also like Meg, Greta, or Margo.

Isn't it strange that a name once so loved and so popular over many centuries from the Middle Ages onwards should have fallen into virtual disuse for children today? I have seen it in a UK poll of the unsexiest names, along with names like Enid and Nora. (Was Margaret Thatcher responsible, perhaps?) Princess Margaret's granddaughter has it, but in the form Margaretta, which was borne by a lovely older half-Italian English actress, Margaretta Scott. I like Margaret, but I like Marguerite better, probably because I love the marguerite daisy. Yet even in France Marguerite's apparently not popular. I hate Madge, Maggie, Margery (like margarine and outdated, as is Marjorie in my opinion). The Hebrew form is Margalit and there was an English writer called Marghanita Laski (I've seen Marghanita described as a Hebrew version of Margaret ("pearl") but alternatively as the name of the scarlet pimpernel flower in Israel, so that's confusing: which is it?). I think that today the Welsh Megan has taken Margaret's place. I like Megan but hate the Aussie pronunciation mee-gan. The Margaret nicknames Peg and Peggy seem dated, but Meg is cute. Daisy is a nickname for girls named Marguerite. Margot is too, but that reminds me of maggot when it's written. I recently read that the trendy version Margaux (as in Hemingway) is really the name of a village outside Bordeaux famous for its red wine!

This message was edited 1/19/2008, 2:03 AM