"What do they call you, boy?" The use of names in Realm of the Elderlings, Part 6

finally, the main character

Time to talk about my favorite guy, FitzChivalry Farseer. There’s so much to be said about Fitz’s relationship with his parents, about his narrating style, about his views on gender and sexuality, about his role as a father, etc. And I believe we can talk about many of these topics by looking at Fitz’s many names in the series. So let’s get started, because this one is very long.

Part 6: “What do they call you, boy?”

‘Boy don’t have a name,’ Jason volunteered into the silence. ‘Just goes by “boy”.’

This statement seemed to put everyone, even Burrich, at a loss for words.

The first book, Assassin’s Apprentice, begins with Fitz as a six year old boy, having just been taken from his mother and given over to the royal family. He tells us he has no name, no past, no memories. Our protagonist is therefore a lump of clay for those around him to mold, a blank page.

Fitz is also an unreliable narrator, he lies, he embellishes, he dramatizes, he lacks all the details and jumps to conclusions. He’s defined by duality, he’s both the boy in the snow and the man in the cabin, both the capable assassin and the trembling victim, both the loyal dog and the snarling wolf. He contains multitudes, as we will see here.

Nameless the Dog Boy.

‘You are the misbegotten bastard of a princeling who had not even the courage to continue as King-in-Waiting. You are the grandson of a dead queen whose common breeding showed in the common woman her eldest son bedded to conceive you. You who take the name to yourself of FitzChivalry Farseer need do no more than scratch yourself to find Nameless the dog-boy. Be grateful I do not send you back to the stables, but suffer to let you abide in the keep.’

Fitz doesn’t get an official name until the last third of Assassin’s Apprentice, when he’s around 15/16 years old. So for almost an entire book, he was Nameless. A boy growing up in the stables, surrounded by animals, sleeping with the dogs. When anyone speaks to him, if they speak to him at all, they call him the fitz, the bastard, or just “boy”. He’s not granted the position of a real person.

For not a man will have her now, not a man, not with this pup running at her heels. So you take him, and give him to his father.’

‘The boy looks well tended. I give it a week, a fortnight at most before she’s whimpering at the kitchen door because she misses her pup.

‘Soggy little pup, you,’

‘Here, Burrich,’ Jason said matter-of-factly. ‘This pup’s for you, now.’

Burrich was a constant in those days, giving me the same care he gave to Chivalry’s beasts; I was fed, watered, groomed and exercised, said exercise usually coming in the form of trotting at his heels as he performed his other duties.

I tried to keep count of how many times Fitz was linked to dogs, either in the narration or in dialogue, but there’s too many. These are all just from Chapter 1. He’s an unwanted puppy begging for any sort of love, the line between him and the dogs that he grows up with gets blurry and he becomes more animal than human.

Those years of Fitz’s life are defined by a sense of “not belonging” and “otherness”. As mentioned before in the Farseer post, Farseer names are both a blessing and a curse, in that the bearer has strong pressure to live up to their name, but they also have a guide for how to live their life. Fitz has nothing of the sort—no identity. It also affects the way others see him. Names are very significant in the Six Duchies, so Fitz claiming that his mother never gave him a name paints a pretty tragic picture. As we later find out, his mother did name him, but perhaps this narrative that he has created around himself is easier for him to live with than the reality that he was loved and taken away from that love. Something we soon learn about Fitz and that has been part of his character for his entire life is that he believes himself unworthy of love, and has a hard time accepting when people care for him.

Newboy.

I was not asked for a name, but simply was called Newboy.

Nosy was with us, as always. The other children had come to accept him as a part of me. I don’t think it ever occurred to them to wonder at our singleness of mind. Newboy and Nosy we were,

In contrast with Fitz’s life at court, we have Fitz’s life on the streets, running around with a group of peasant children. Here, he's not the bastard, he’s simply the new kid. His lack of background is meaningless, and he’s accepted without conditions by the group, without responsibilities to tie him down. His relationship with “Newboy” is similar to his relationship with Molly, the girl he met at that time and fell in love with — Newboy and Molly are free of the Farseers, he creates a bubble around them and idealizes their time together. This is purely fiction, of course, Newboy can’t exist for long, and Molly was not “free” during her childhood, but Fitz still feels nostalgic about their time together as Newboy and Molly Nosebleed.

FitzChivalry Farseer.

I halted, frozen by the words. I turned slowly.

‘It’s your name, boy. I wrote it myself, in the military log, on the day you were brought to me. Another thing I had thought you knew. Stop thinking of yourself as the bastard, FitzChivalry Farseer.

I think this scene is purposefully ironic. Verity tells Fitz to stop thinking of himself as the bastard, yet he gives him a name that even more strongly marks him as one.

The name shows that Verity sees Fitz as an extension of his brother, but by never deigning to use it in all that time, it also shows that Verity and Shrewd, if he knew about it, don’t bother thinking about Fitz until he’s useful to them. They are Farseers; they know how important names are in their culture, especially for their family. If Verity didn’t tell Shrewd about it, it paints an even worse picture for both of them, as it makes Verity incredibly careless, and it means that Shrewd spent all that time thinking of Fitz as just a bastard. Either way, this scene, while presented as a sign of love and welcoming Fitz into the family, only exposes how little they cared about Fitz. Verity is a nice man, but his relationship with Fitz is not as healthy as Fitz sees it as.

Clearly, the most important aspect of the name is how it binds Fitz to his father. He will always be Chivalry’s mistake and his downfall, and he will spend his entire life being reminded of that. Chivalry is the ideal hero, the gallant knight in shining armor—everything a prince should be. Fitz is rough and wild; he’s prone to anger and violence, and he’s constantly making mistakes. Fitz is his father’s opposite, even down to what weapon they use. His father was a skilled swordsman, but Fitz fights with an axe, a less elegant and more brutal weapon. And yet, Fitz and Chivalry complete each other. Chivalry was too perfect; his bastard son humanized him, and Fitz, despite never meeting his father, tries to live by his ideals of honor and responsibility, and fails to be perfect just like him.

Keppet.

‘Keppet,’ said the woman at the next mat as I completed my purchase. I glanced at her, thinking she was addressing the woman I had just paid. But she was staring at me. ‘Keppet,’ she said, quite insistently, and I wondered what it meant in her language. It seemed a request for something, but the older woman only stared coldly out into the street, so I shrugged at her younger neighbour apologetically and turned away as I stowed the nuts in my basket.

I hadn’t gone more than a dozen steps when I heard her shriek, ‘Keppet!’ yet again. I looked back to see the two women engaged in a struggle. The older one gripped the younger one’s wrists and the younger one thrashed and kicked to be free of her.

Way back on the second part of this analysis series, I mentioned Chapter 6 of Assassin’s Apprentice, “Chivalry’s Shadow”. This is perhaps one of the most important chapters in all 16 books. During this chapter, the death of Chivalry is announced, which in itself is a huge moment for Fitz’s character, but there’s an even bigger scene before that: we meet Fitz’s biological mother.

This scene is where Fitz lies the most to the reader. From the start of the story, he insists on having no memories of his mother, despite the fact that he’s around six years old by the time he’s taken away from her. He also insists that his mother never named him. Here, a woman in the market calls out to Fitz, screaming the name “Keppet” and trying to reach him, only to be stopped by an older woman. Fitz moves on from this interaction suspiciously fast, and the woman is not mentioned again until Assassin’s Quest, when he admits that she was his mother.

Keppet appears exactly 6 times in all 9 Fitz-centric books, the three first times in the passage above, and then three more times in Fool’s Fate, once in a dream and then when the Fool gives back Fitz’s memories. It is possible that the Fool learned of this name at that time, but nothing confirms this. As far as the reader knows, the knowledge of this name died with Fitz. Why did he never share it with the Fool, who himself gave Fitz his “true name”? There are some possible answers that come up when we compare this name with the next one on the list.

Tom Badgerlock.

‘And what do they call you, boy?’

The question again. ‘Boy is fine,’ I muttered. The sleeping puppy in my arms whimpered in agitation. I forced myself to be calm for him.

I had the satisfaction of seeing a stricken look flit briefly across Patience’s face. ‘I shall call you, oh, Thomas. Tom for everyday. Does that suit you?’

‘I suppose so,’ I said deliberately. Burrich gave more thought to naming a dog than that. We had no Blackies or Spots in the stables. Burrich named each beast as if they were royalty, with names that described them or traits he aspired to for them. Even Sooty’s name masked a gentle fire I had come to respect. But this woman named me Tom after no more than an indrawn breath. I looked down so that she couldn’t see my eyes.

Patience’s choice seems superficial at first, which is also how Fitz sees her at this time, but just as his relationship with Patience evolves into a deeper bond, and he grows to see her for the complex woman she is, we eventually find out that there’s more behind the name. Patience takes the name from Chivalry’s letters to Verity, where they use the code “Tom-cat” to refer to Fitz. She’s calling him by the only “name” his father gave him.

More important to note is how it changed to “Tom Badgerlock”. Despite his initial distaste, it’s the first thing that he comes up with when he needs an alias. At this point, Patience is his mother, and he embraces the name she chose, which stands out even more considering he never takes up the name his biological mother gave him. Perhaps this reflects his feeling of betrayal, his deep hurt at being separated from her, or his wish to keep that other name safe from being used by others. Perhaps his choice to embrace Tom but not Keppet is about him accepting that he can never go back to his biological mother, and claiming Patience as his true family. Maybe it’s all these things at the same time.

Catalyst, Changer.

No one may speak or write of the ceremony details. This, I think, I may say: as each life was put into my hands – fish, bird and beast – I chose to release it, not to death but back to its own free existence. So nothing died at my ceremony, and hence no one feasted. But even in my state of mind at that time, I felt there had been enough blood and death around me to last a lifetime, and I refused to kill with hands or teeth. My Man still chose to give me a name, so He could not have been totally displeased. The name is in the old tongue, which has no letters and cannot be written. Nor have I ever found any with which I chose to share the knowledge of my Man name. But its ancient meaning, I think, I can divulge here. Catalyst. The Changer.

Chapter 17 of Assassin’s Apprentice, “The Trial” begins with an epigraph describing a rite of passage known as the Man Ceremony which takes place when a boy reaches fourteen. This chapter marks an important turning point for Fitz’s character development, as it is the chapter where Galen puts his Skill to the test by sending him to Forge, where he’s attacked by the zombie-like Forged, at the same time that an attack is carried out on Burrich. While Fitz is fighting the Forged ones, he senses the attack on Burrich and feels his dog, Smithy, dying to protect him. This chapter starts by detailing a ceremony that grants passage into adulthood, and by the end of it, the safety that Burrich represented for Fitz has been taken away. He’s no longer his boy or one of his pups. He’s a man, and he has to fight his own battles.

Obviously, it’s significant that his “Man name” translates to Catalyst. Fitz stands out from other fantasy protagonists in that his role in the story is often not the expected role of the hero; rather, he’s the person who puts events into motion and helps the heroic figures achieve their goals, always acting in the shadows. He’s a tool. More interesting to me is that the name means both Catalyst and Changer. Changer echoes the naming traditions of the Farseers, which begs the question of who was the “Man" that named Fitz. A possibility could be Verity, the only member of the Farseers who would participate in such an event, but I lean towards Burrich.

Burrich may not be related to Fitz by blood, but there’s no doubt that Fitz sees him as his father. He raised Fitz for most of his childhood, and he passed down his ideas of what a man should be to him. Men are strong, capable, responsible and honorable; they show respect to everyone, including animals, and over everything else, they keep their feelings to themselves. Burrich is the most emotionally repressed man in the Six Duchies, and he did not teach Fitz how to deal with his emotions, instead teaching him to drink away his worries. He gets Fitz drunk for the first time when the boy is around 10 years old. Many of Fitz’s rigid ideas of gender and sexuality come from Burrich, so I think Burrich being the one to choose Fitz’s “Man” name makes the most sense.

Beloved.

“He did mean you, did he not? Well, of course he did, though you may not know it. I doubt you know the custom of the people he came from; how they exchange names to denote the lifelong bonds they form? Did you ever call him by your name, to show him that he was as dear to you as your own life? Did you? Or were you too much of a coward to let him know?”

I have already talked about how meaningful the exchange of names between Fitz and Beloved on Beloved’s own analysis, so I won’t be going over that again. Instead, I just want to make note of yet another instance where a turning point in Fitz’s life is symbolized by a “name ceremony” of sorts. Once Fitz accepts being called Beloved by the Fool, their relationship becomes a lot more open, and Fitz stops feeling ashamed of the Fool’s love for him. It’s a moment of acceptance and change. The symbolism of names in Fitz’s life can’t be made more obvious; they are markers for his growth as a person and his relationships with others, and no relationship is more important in Fitz’s life than his relationship with the Fool.

Conclusion — so why do names matter?

The deep importance given to names in the Six Duchies is introduced to us in the very first chapter of the series. Robin Hobb utilizes names to present a character and what their story is about: the Farseers are defined by how they try to live up to their names; Molly by her role in Fitz’s life; Bee and Nettle by their separation from the main family; Beloved by their queer identity; and Fitz himself is defined by a lack of identity, a constant struggle to find a name that really represents him. This is why he’s introduced to us as nameless, so we can see him try on different names until he forms his own sense of self. I believe that, just like Beloved, Fitz's “true self” is the combination of all the different people he’s been during his life, but while Beloved has always been confident in who they are, Fitz spends his entire life doubting himself and not knowing who he “should” be.

The magical power of names is present in many fantasy media and in real-life folklore, but I think Realm of the Elderlings makes use of them in a particularly clever way. Some authors name their characters after flowers that have special meanings; some use words that come from foreign languages; and some name their characters after a mythical figure or famous person to draw parallels with them. But Robin Hobb integrates the names of her characters into her worldbuilding, in a way similar to Ursula K. LeGuin in Earthsea, and delves deeply into the relationship between a character and what they are called. Names say as much about a person’s identity as they say about that person’s role in their society. A name can be used to demonstrate love and respect, just as it can be used as an insult and a weapon.

There are many things to talk about when it comes to Realm of the Elderlings —the themes of fatherhood, the ecological message, the gender dynamics present in the story, the complex worldbuilding, etc. The most interesting aspect of Hobb’s writing, in my opinion, will always be the way she handles characterization and how in-depth she goes with her character studies. Few authors are able to craft such realistic characters as hers. And names are a key to understanding her characters, which is why I decided to write this series—to showcase an aspect of her work that I think should be talked about more.