Enid

Enid stepped out of the Mabinogion wearing silence like a cloak. In the medieval Welsh tale of Geraint and Enid, she is the patient wife whose name is often glossed as soul or life, and Tennyson later carried her into Victorian drawing rooms through the Idylls of the King, where she became the emblem of quiet, tested faithfulness. It's a literary origin of unusual depth — not a saint's life but an actual narrative, with tension and consequence and a character who is more interesting than she's often given credit for.

The two syllables land with a small, firm click: EE-nid, no softening gesture at the end. For a generation, Enid Blyton attached the name to lending-library shelves and Famous Five adventures, which was both a gift — beloved, warm — and a mild burden of association. Now that generation's grandchildren are naming their own children, and Enid is beginning to stir again, reclaimed by parents drawn to pre-war literary names that feel decisive rather than decorative. It belongs in the company of Vera or Agnes: a little stern at first, quietly luminous once you're inside it. Enid doesn't flirt. Enid remembers.