Richard

For people wondering why Dick is a nickname for Richard, it’s the same reason that Bob is a nickname for Robert, Peg is a nickname for Margaret, and Bill is a nickname for William. These all arose due to rhyming slang in the Middle Ages, and in fact, Dick was not the only rhyming nickname of Richard, “Hick” was also used back in those days, but fell out of favor. Even though Rick or Rich seems like the most natural nickname to us, Dick was by far the most popular until it gained its modern meaning.

Richard loosely translates in Russian and Ukrainian as “Rikka.”

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Presumably named after “Stalichnikov”.

"Ri" = King (Gall, Gaelic, Celtic, and Modern Irish)

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"char" = Firey, wind of life breathing in and out your head; Soul

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"d" = Demarcation of divinity, definite article "the".

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An in-depth explanation follows, if interested...

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Richard is a divine king chosen by God and blessed with an equally divine soul from God living in his head that lives and breathes the will and power of God. The name precedes Christianity back to ancient Gall, which means it isn't in the Bible and isn't Christian per se. Still, as the Gall, Gaelics, and Celtics fell to Rome and converted to Catholicism, these meanings were carried on in tradition. Most famously Richard the Lionhearted devoted much of his reign and life to the crusades to preserve Christian holy sites, relics, and history. However, the name still bears traditional meaning in regard to Druid and Goeth beliefs.

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Richard came from the Norse as Ryker but then was assimilated into Gall, pre Julias Caesar before any Roman is known to set foot on the shores of Western Europe. "Richard" is first known recorded use was in 44 A.D. as either a minor king or general that fought valiantly but eventually lost during the Roman invasion or Roman-Gaelic war.

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"Ri" is Gall for "King" of which there were many where fiefdom got its start - "Ard Ri" would be "High King" and is either the chicken or the egg of the legends of King Arthur (Ard was "Arth" and "Ri" was transliterated from Middle English to "ur", hence King Art or King Arthur. "Ri" continues to be the word for king in native Irish. Also being former members of the Gall, then Gaelic, then Celtic empires, French, Portuguese, and Spanish have remarkably similarly pronounced words for "king". "Ri" would have been pronounced with a glotteral "R" that sounds like a gargle or a vocal gruff "H" in English... similar to how the French and Portuguese pronounce words beginning with "R" today.

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"-char-" prior to 1300 would have been "-ghar-" or "-ghal". "L" and "R" were pronounced so similarly by the Romans and similarly enough by the conquered Gaelics who wanted no part in the phoneticization of their language into Latin, so confusion. These letters were often switched in writing, then eventually writing led to pronunciation and the true form was lost since there all now dead languages.

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Whether "-ghar-" or "-ghal-", in antecedent Gall they were either "gar" or "gal". "Gall" being the name of the culture, both have very steeped spiritual roots. "Gal" meant the holy breath of life breathed into the head, while "Gar" meant the holy breath of life exhaled or uttered. One is breathing in your mind, and the other was speaking your mind. Also, permutations of these words meant "Head", "Skull", "Bone", "Yell", "Groan", and "War". In English a form still exists as "gale" or wind (God's breath... wind...). In particular, "Gale" refers to the westerly wind that comes in and warms the west coast of Europe; the Germans call it "Golf". "Gwar" and "Guerra" are examples from other languages with Gaelic influence that mean "War". According to the New Testament, this root word can even be found in the name given to the hill where Jesus Christ was crucified, Golgotha, meaning "The Skull". While Richard is not a Christian name by origin, the language from which it grew was consequential enough early enough to phonically influence the names of of famous places in Christendom like "Golgotha" and "Galilea", the "Gol" and the "Gal" of which phonetically evolved into the modern English second sylable of "Richard".

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Finally, "-d" meant divine. In English the definite article is "the", it recognizes a noun and puts it into orbit to be either subject or object, to act or be acted upon. Essentially, "the" defines or gives some definition to the noun as a particular as opposed to "a" or "some" which leaves the noun "indefinite" - perhaps incidental but specifically unimportant to a story that may be told. This concept of articles originated in ancient Semitic languages of the near east, but the definite article more than defined it demarcated something as divine - like acknowledging God's hand in it. Unlike in English where we precede the noun with "the", in Semitic languages it was/is a "t" or a "'t" dropped within the word, often at the end. Since the Semitic "t" was pronounced like the "th" in "the", English by royal decree implemented "the" as its definite article. But, since in many Latin languages, including Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian pronounce the letter "d" like the English "the" in "the", when King James Court and William Shakespeare were Latinizing Middle English into Modern English in the 14th century, the divine/definite article landed at the end of Richar in the form of a "d", which also tips the English hat to the Gaelic roots it also shares with these other countries.

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So, that's the gist on the mighty name Richard.

I recall that it carried the meaning of "Stern, but Just".

My husband is named Richard and I read that it meant "powerful ruler".