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According to Elza Soares Wikipedia entry, her first husband was named Lourdes Antônio Soares.

Can 'Lourdes' be a boy's name in Brazil? Is this information correct?

Since Elsa took her husbands name 'Soares', I assume 'Soares' is here correctly given as her husband's last name.
To me "Antônio Lourdes" would sound more masculine, in the same way as 'José Maria' is a masculine name.

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  • Me's of Braziland. I've only seen "Lurdes", but the author may have written "Lourdes" for an English speaker to say it similar to a Portuguese speaker. "L(o)urdes" for a boy is not something that I've seen, although names can be anything and anyone's, so I believe it is correct for a Brazilian, just maybe uncommon.
    – Schilive
    Commented Mar 12, 2021 at 20:30
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    @Schilive: well, in the pt.wiki they also talk about Lourdes. He was born long ago (maybe 100 yrs ago), one possibility is that it was written like that in the past.
    – Quora Feans
    Commented Mar 12, 2021 at 22:21
  • Quora Fens, names' spelling varie so much in any language, so maybe it was written and spoken like that, maybe it was a try of writing according to etymology. There are many possibilities. But as the point of your question was if it is or not a possible name for a Brazilian boy, the answer is yes. I don't know if it is/was common, but surely possible.
    – Schilive
    Commented Mar 12, 2021 at 22:50
  • @Schilive: do you know any famous man named 'Lurdes'? I can only find it applied to women (or places).
    – Quora Feans
    Commented Mar 13, 2021 at 0:23
  • Quora Feans, I don't know any, but there must be at least one.
    – Schilive
    Commented Mar 13, 2021 at 0:39

6 Answers 6

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According to IBGE (Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística — Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics) on https://censo2010.ibge.gov.br/nomes/#/search, in Brazil there were at least 20 males being born with the name “Lurdes” at least since 1930 to 1970:

Frequency of people being born with the name "Lurdes" in Brazil since 1930

But also with the name “Lourdes”:

Frequency of people being born with the name "Lourdes" in Brazil since 1930

Therefore, a Brazilian male can have the name “Lourdes” or “Lurdes”, even though it is absurdly uncommon.

Interesting that the chances of seeing a man with the name should be even rarer since the chances of a baby getting to adulthood was lower at the time.

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  • Excellent. It's worth it noticing that frequencies below 20 are not shown ("Somente são apresentados os nomes cuja frequência é maior ou igual a 20") and that's probably why the plot stops in 1970 (for females, for whom, by the way, "Lourdes" also displays a huge drop in popularity, the plots goes until 2000).
    – stafusa ♦
    Commented Mar 16, 2021 at 17:47
  • @stafusa, thanks. I didn't mention because I didn't think it mattered for the question, since it is just “can ‘Lourdes’ be a boy's name?”. But I've already got an idea. Thanks for commenting.
    – Schilive
    Commented Mar 16, 2021 at 18:06
  • I agree it's not important, I only mention it as a curiosity, because the range of the graph looked strange to me, so it was nice the website had an explanation.
    – stafusa ♦
    Commented Mar 16, 2021 at 18:07
  • @stafusa, I looked at the graph multiple times, while and after doing the answer, and I didn't notice the weird range. Thanks for commenting.
    – Schilive
    Commented Mar 16, 2021 at 18:12
  • Well, that settles the issue, even if it seems to be similar to A Boy Named Sue-type of situation.
    – Quora Feans
    Commented Mar 17, 2021 at 21:19
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Há anos, as Certidões de Nascimento eram feitas em máquinas de datilografia ou até manualmente. E nem sempre quem ia registrar a criança era alfabetizado para poder verificar o erro. Poderia ser erro de digitação ou de comunicação mesmo. Naquela época, deveria haver muitos sotaques distintos cuja conversação poderia ser confusa. Encaminhada pelo link que postou, está no texto: "Aos 12 anos, foi forçada pelo pai a se casar com Lourdes Antônio Soares, também conhecida como Alaúrdes". Ou seja, o mais provável é que o nome deveria ser ALAÚRDES e o cartório registrou erroneamente como LOURDES.

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Yes, "Lourdes" can a boy's name, in the sense that giving this name to a boy is not illegal in Brazil, and also that there are dozens of males with this name on record - check Schilive's answer.

But it should also be said that, as attested many other answers and also by "baby name" sites such as:

"Lourdes" is overwhelmingly considered to be a female name in Portuguese. Also, according to IBGE, there are some 165'000 females with this name, and only 194 males in Brazil (with comparable numbers for "Lurdes").

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No Brasil, normalmente quem tem o nome de Lourdes são mulheres, é raro encontrar algum homem com esse nome.

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No Brasil existe muito preconceito com alguns tipos de nomes, e com certeza o nome Lourdes em uma criança do sexo masculino iria gerar bullying pois é muito associado à pessoas do gênero feminino. Nomes como Maria de Lourdes são bastante comuns em nosso país.

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Por conta da pronuncia brasileira o nome Lurdes parece ser mais feminino , mas quando pronunciado em inglês som ai sim já soa familiar aos nomes masculinos que temos hoje no Brasil. Portando,não geralmente será um nome usado para menina

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