MICAHmBiblical, English Contracted form of MICAIAH. Micah is one of the twelve minor prophets of the Old Testament. He authored the Book of Micah, which alternates between prophesies of doom and prophesies of restoration. It was occasionally used as an English given name by the Puritans after the Protestant Reformation, but it did not become common until the end of the 20th century.
PARNELfEnglish (Archaic) Contracted form of PETRONEL. In the later Middle Ages it became a slang term for a promiscuous woman, and the name subsequently fell out of use.
RALPHmEnglish, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, German Contracted form of the Old Norse name RÁÐÚLFR (or its Norman form Radulf). Scandinavian settlers introduced it to England before the Norman Conquest, though afterwards it was bolstered by Norman influence. In the Middle Ages it was usually spelled Ralf, but by the 17th century it was most commonly Rafe, reflecting the normal pronunciation. The Ralph spelling appeared in the 18th century. A famous bearer of the name was Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882), an American poet and author who wrote on transcendentalism.