The sound of crumpling parchment. The smell of old books as they are paged through lovingly. The rough texture of brown tweed run between your fingertips. The cool feel of marble against your bare skin. If nothing in the world is as appealing to you as this, you may be a lover of dark academia.
But what is dark academia? Let’s explain.
Dark academia “revolves around classic literature, the pursuit of self-discovery, and a general passion for knowledge and learning. It is one of several iterations of the Academia aesthetic, each having a unique subject focus.” Part gothic, part prep, and a lot mystery and high-mindedness, this aesthetic is going strong on Tumblr and Tik Tok and can be see popping up in countless Pinterest boards packed with images of dimly-lit libraries and dusty book spines. Dark academia has also inspired a growing genre of books and stories and has made its way into popular movies and television shows like Penny Dreadful and the Umbrella Academy
In this Names in Fiction list, we’ve gathered names that would fit into a world of dark academics, whether you are using the names for your child-to-be or for fictional characters navigating the hallowed halls of learning.
We’ve broken down names in two ways. First, we grab name inspiration from history. Much of dark academia’s aesthetic stems from the academic culture of 19th-century: upper-class, aristocratic western Europeans. To us, that means the study of the Ancient Greek and Romans, including not just their gods but their thinkers and warriors. However, to only seek inspiration from such a small part of the world is limiting, so we sought to diversify the aesthetic by including names from the world over.
We also categorized names by personality types because we imagine that the world of the dark academic is filled with precocious writers, deep thinkers, snooty aristocrats, tortured artists, and dabblers in the dark arts. While some names in these subcategories (philosophers, literati, preps, goths, the beaux arts) are inspired by actual famous people who were writers, thinkers, and artists, we’ve also grouped other names by their “feel.” For instance, Odette sounds romantic and artistic, while Solomon sounds wise like a philosopher. These categories, we hope, might help you find the perfect name for your character’s archetype.
Read on for the full list and let us know your thoughts in the comments! Did we hit the mark? Will you find some inspiration among these some 300 names for your future writing project?
Gods Among Men
- Abira
- Ahura
- Albiorix
- Amana
- Ammit
- Anansi
- Antigone
- Anubis
- Apollo
- Athene
- Bochia
- Demeter
- Ceres
- Chel
- Freya
- Frigga
- Hera
- Hermes
- Hephaestus
- Horus
- Iocaste
- Isis
- Itzamná
- Juno
- Marduk
- Mergan
- Minerva
- Mithra
- Odin
- Osiris
- Proserpina
- Shiva
- Tezca
- Tyr
- Vesta
- Vidar
- Xolas
The Ancients
- Agrippina
- Alcibiades
- Amina
- Archimedes
- Arete
- Augustus
- Cato
- Cicero
- Constantine
- Coriolanus
- Cyrus
- Demosthenes
- Darius
- Dido
- Drusilla
- Euclid
- Hadrian
- Hannibal
- Hecuba
- Herodotus
- Hypatia
- Inti
- Livia
- Lucretius
- Makeda
- Plutarch
- Polemon
- Ramses
- Seneca
- Sidharth
- Valentine
- Xerxes
The Philosophers
- Achebe
- Acrio
- Afric
- Agnes
- Arx
- Auguste
- Avice
- Baptiste
- Boman
- Carus
- Clemency
- Cornelius
- Daria
- DuBois
- Eartha
- Fanon
- Florrian
- Gilles
- Herodotus
- Iago
- Kairos
- Lazlo
- Leopold
- Margaux
- Mendel
- Michiko
- Nemo
- Orla
- Pallas
- Reginald
- Rowan
- Silva
- Solomon
- Tallis
- Tecumseh
- Temperance
- Tisias
- Ugo
- Vivek
- Xantippe
- Zita
The Literati
- Adair
- Adamaris
- Agatha
- Allegra
- Althea
- Anais
- Atticus
- Benedict
- Briseis
- Clemont
- Collette
- Edwidge
- Elias
- Eliza
- Enola
- Fatima
- Fennimore
- Forsythe
- Françoise
- Hakim
- Hugo
- James
- Jude
- Keats
- Lysander
- Marceline
- Mathilde
- Melville
- Palma
- Poe
- Prudence
- Sylvie
- Thoreau
- Ulysses
- Woolf
- Wordsworth
- Xenobia
The Preps
- Adira
- Aeneas
- Agraine
- Basil
- Blythe
- Bronwyn
- Christabel
- Cleo
- Cressida
- Ekene
- Elodie
- Eugenia
- Evander
- Florence
- Foster
- George
- Henrik
- Hestia
- Imber
- Katherine
- Klaus
- Marguerite
- Martine
- Maude
- Nerissa
- Philomena
- Poppy
- Regius
- Renata
- Sigrid
- Siobhan
- Sloane
- Soames
- Sterling
- Talia
- Theodosia
- Thierry
- Wilder
- Zeki
The Decadents
- Adalinda
- Amirah
- Aracia
- Antoni
- Alius
- Anatoly
- Araminta
- Astoria
- Benoit
- Brisha
- Byron
- Calliope
- Caspian
- Celine
- Dio
- Dolores
- Dulcinea
- Eleanora
- Evangeline
- Ezra
- Fabia
- Felix
- Galena
- Heathcliff
- Honoré
- Ignis
- Lev
- Magnus
- Merced
- Nohemí
- Nova
- Orlando
- Perseus
- Pietro
- Prithi
- Salome
- Siân
- Siro
- Tariq
- Valentina
- Xander
The Goths
- Andreas
- Andromeda
- Ariadne
- Ayo
- Bram
- Callista
- Catroina
- Damien
- Esme
- Evander
- Hecate
- Hiram
- Invicta
- Jasper
- Lucien
- Magnus
- Malachi
- Melisandre
- Merle
- Nissa
- Nyx
- Octavia
- Paloma
- Pandora
- Radcliff
- Rafael
- Raven
- Rue
- Sebastian
- Seraphina
- Sorcha
- Tarsus
- Tris
- Tyrranus
- Umbra
- Vitalis
- Ximena
- Zeno
The Beaux Artists
- Aers
- Alaïa
- Alphonse
- Azrael
- Beatrix
- Belen
- Camille
- Collette
- Currier
- Damascus
- Delphine
- Ekaterina
- Endymion
- Faline
- Gaius
- Helene
- Hero
- Hippolyta
- Immanuel
- Inigo
- Irene
- Isolde
- Julieta
- Nikolai
- Odette
- Onegin
- Ophelia
- Penelope
- Rocco
- Simone
- Sors
- Taliesin
- Tarquin
- Theodorus
- Victore
- Yves
And that’s our list of dark academia names! For more inspiration, check out our 10 Tips for Picking a Character Name. Or look into our archive and browse through our other character naming ideas!