When did nicknames become prevalent in the US?

My wild stab in the dark is that nick names existed since the invention of names.

I can’t remember a day in my life when nicknames weren’t used. My Mom’s sister & my dad’s brother both had a nickname & they were both at least 20 years older than me. My Grandmother also had a nickname that had NOTHING to do with her name. I think hers might have been a pet name bestowed by my Granddad. I was under the same impression as you on Jeff Davis. Now I’m questioning whether his friends called him Jeff or lazy scholars started calling him Jeff. I’m thinking that FDR might have been Frankie.

My father’s nickname in high school was “Onions”, he played tackle in football and would eat a onion before the game and blow at the opposing lineman.

I think nicknames have always existed.

There are names that just lend themselves to nicknames. Like @ragingloli can be Loli, Rags, Lols, Ragingbaby, Lolipop, etc.

or like @Caravanfan can be Fanny.

@ragingloli I have a funny story about that. About 30 years ago I was traveling alone through Ecuador and I met a nice Welsh woman and we hung out for a few days. She and I went to the Equator and did the thing where we stood on the Northern Hemisphere and Southern Hemisphere on the line. At the time I was wearing one of those geeky hip packs which I called a ‘fanny pack”. When I mentioned that she looked at me funny and said, “You know what a ‘fanny’ is in Britian, right? It means ‘vagina’ ”

30 years later we are still good friends. My wife and I stayed with her family in South Wales for a few days a couple of months ago.

I had an Aunt Fanny. :)

I think nicknames have probably been around a long time, but I do think some cultures use them more than others when they are not short for a name. I would think when it’s a short form of a name it probably does go back as long as people have been given names.

Edit: I found this: https://www.britannica.com/topic/nickname

@JLeslie Oh I had an Aunt Fanny also. I think that all Jews somewhere have an Aunt Fanny. I don’t know what her Yiddish name was.

I believe that Fanny is the Americanized version of Feigele, which was a common Yiddish girl’s name in Europe.

^^as in gay? I never realized that was a woman’s name.

No – Feigele meaning gay came way later.

Feigele Name Meaning
Jewish (Ashkenazic): from the Yiddish female personal name Feygl, which is from Yiddish foygl ‘bird’ (compare Vogel ), a translation of the Hebrew name Tsipora (Zipporah) ‘bird’, borne by the wife of Moses.

@elbanditoroso Way later, but that’s how it was used when I was growing up. I guess it was slang, not sure if it’s still used. I’m not around as much Yiddish nowadays except for the Yiddish Word of the Day facebook group. Highly recommend the group so fun when words and phrases pop up that remind me of childhood.