Greek Name Generator

Modern Greek names follow rules that are easy to get wrong. Most given names are saints' names (Giorgos, Dimitris, Maria, Eleni) handed down from grandparents, and nearly everyone has a formal version and a casual one: Konstantinos becomes Kostas, Panagiotis becomes Panos, Aikaterini becomes Katerina. Surnames change with gender, because a woman carries the genitive form: Papadopoulos for a man, Papadopoulou for his sister, and Papadakis becomes Papadaki. Endings also hint at origin, with -opoulos from the Peloponnese, -akis from Crete, -idis from Pontic and Macedonian families, -atos from the Ionian islands and -oglou from Asia Minor refugees.

Ancient Greek names worked differently. A citizen had one name, often built from two meaningful roots (Demosthenes is 'strength of the people', Kallisthenes 'beautiful strength'), and was identified by his father or his city: Aristarchos of Samos, Hippias of Elis. Women's names used the same roots with feminine endings, giving Arsinoe, Berenike, Myrrhine and Theano.

This generator keeps the two registers separate so you can pull a believable contemporary Athenian for a novel, or a period-correct Hellenistic scholar or Spartan queen for historical fiction, tabletop games and Greek-flavored fantasy settings.