Seán

I have a relative known in English as John, but in his primarily Gaelic-speaking village he's always been known as Seán, even -though- he's christened John. It's rather confusing as in England he's known as 'Johnny', and in Ireland always called Seán, but I also have a close relative named after him whose real name everywhere is Seán and whose christened name is also John, but who is never, ever actually called John. I would call this an Irish name. Sorry to the above poster, but you're talking serious B.S. As John is an English name, Seán is an Irish name... besides, Seán is so, so, so, so, so common in Ireland, I can't see any debate at all here. Sorry.

Very impressed by your site. What I wanted to tell you was that a friend of mine, from Scottish descent, mentioned that the word 'SEAN' also means blessing - as in god blessed me with this wonderful child.

The name Sean is an ancient Gaelic name with multiple meanings but is definitely not the Gaelic or Irish form of John. Considering that the Gaelic language is more than 5,000 years old and the English language is a little over 1500 years old.