Cauldrons & Bill Weasley

[GulPlum <hp@plum.cream.org>]

No: HPFGUIDX 50866

Steve <bboy> wrote:

> How common is it for someone to be called 'Bill' in the UK? In the 
US,
> Bill is frequently short for William. But I notice that Prince 
William
> is called Will, while Prince Henry is called Harry.
> 
> So again, I'm wondering how common the nickname 'Bill' is in the UK.
> If it is somewhat common that would lead us to think that Bill's 
name
> is Williamm. If it is very uncommon then we could conclude that Bill
> had an unusual name that lent itself well to the nickname Bill.
> 
> Do we have a resident authority who could help us out here?

"Bill" is definitely more common than "Will", at least in the general 
population (the Royal Family is every so slightly a case apart; 
Prince Will is a moniker he was given by the press as soon as he was 
born; they quite possibly thought that "Bill" sounded a bit too 
common). 

"Will" is probably less prevalent as an abbreviation for William in 
the UK than it is in the US. For every Bill Clinton, there's a Will 
Smith; for every Bill Paxman there's a Will Shatner (though 
admittedly only his friends call him that; ordinary mortals call him 
William). 

I'm trying to think of famous British Williams who go by "Will" of 
their own choice, and to be perfectly honest the only one I can think 
of right now is Will Young. I can think of lots of Bills, though: 
Bill Ashton and Bill Treacher, for starters. And slightly 
facetiously, The (Old) Bill. :-)

Yes, I'm aware that people outside the UK won't have heard of any of 
them, and I suspect are wondering what The Old Bill means. :-)

As a rough indicator, I've just gone through an alphabetical listing 
of all UK Members of Parliament (in which people are named as they 
like to call themselves rather than their full names, so our esteemed 
Prime Minister is listed as Tony rather than Anthony). I found six 
Bills but err... not a single Will (and interestingly, only two 
Williams).

Does that answer your question? :-)