Definition
A name other than a person's formal legal name, adopted or applied for brevity, familiarity, or affection. In legal contexts, a nickname is a shortened or informal form of a given name — not a distinct name assumed for purposes of concealment or fraud — and carries no inherent implication of contempt or disrepute. Its legal significance arises almost exclusively in matters of identity: whether a document, instrument, pleading, or record naming a person by nickname sufficiently identifies that person to bind them or establish their rights.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): To give a nickname to a person or thing (verb form); by extension, the nickname itself is an informal or substitute name, often affectionate or mocking.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): "A name given in contempt, derision, or sportive familiarity; a familiar or an opprobrious appellation."
The gap here is meaningful. Webster's 1913 definition emphasizes contempt or derision as a defining feature of a nickname. The legal definition, as consistently stated across the historical dictionaries, explicitly rejects this — a nickname in law conveys no idea of opprobrium and frequently evinces affection or familiarity. A researcher relying on the common or popular sense of the word (mockery, insult) will misread legal discussions of nickname, which treat the term as identity-neutral shorthand.
Common Confusion
Nickname vs. Alias: These terms are sometimes used interchangeably in non-legal writing but carry different implications in legal sources. An alias typically signals a name used in place of one's legal name, sometimes with a suggestion of concealment or prior identity. A nickname is understood as a familiar shortening of the legal name with no implication of fraud or concealment. In criminal records and older court documents, the distinction affects how the court treated identity challenges.
Nickname vs. Assumed Name: An assumed name (or fictitious name) is a name adopted for business or personal use that differs substantially from the legal name and is often subject to statutory registration requirements. A nickname, in legal usage, is not an assumed name in this sense.
Why It Matters in Research
Nickname appears in legal sources almost exclusively in the context of name sufficiency — whether a contract, deed, will, indictment, or pleading that names a party by nickname rather than legal name is valid and enforceable against or on behalf of that person. The operative question is identification: if the nickname is habitually used and the person is known by it, courts have generally found it sufficient.
In older sources, particularly equity cases, courts drew a distinction between a nickname (harmless shortening, no fraud) and an alias (a separate name, sometimes implying concealment). Researchers working in 19th-century chancery records, wills, and deeds should be alert to this distinction, as the same informal name might be treated as a nickname in one context and an alias in another depending on the purpose for which it was used.
The citation anchoring most historical dictionary entries — North Carolina Institute v. Norwood, 45 N.C. 74 — is the functional source for the standard legal formulation. Researchers encountering the definition in Black's or Bouvier's should know they are reading language drawn from that case, not from statutory or common law doctrine developed independently.
Anderson's cross-reference to NAME rather than providing an independent entry signals that nickname was treated as a subcategory of the broader name doctrine, not as a standalone legal concept. Follow that cross-reference in period sources.
No federal statutory definition of nickname exists. Its significance in modern practice appears most often in criminal law (indictment sufficiency when a defendant is charged under a nickname), identity fraud, professional licensing, and occasionally in contract disputes over party identification.
Historical Dictionary Support
All four historical dictionaries converge on the same core formulation: a nickname is a short name, cut off for brevity, carrying no opprobrium, and often expressing affection or familiarity. Black's 1st and 2nd editions, and Bouvier's, share nearly identical language traceable to the North Carolina case. This uniformity across dictionaries reflects consensus rather than independent scholarship — all are drawing from the same judicial source.
What the historical dictionaries do not address: the procedural consequences of naming a party by nickname in a pleading or instrument. They define the concept but leave its operational legal effects to case law. Researchers should not expect the dictionary entries to resolve questions of instrument validity or party identity — those require primary sources.
Bouvier's entry in the provided source material contains an apparent pagination error, interpolating text from an unrelated entry (next of kin). This is a known hazard with multi-volume historical dictionaries where scanning or compilation introduced mismatched content. The substantive Bouvier's definition of nickname matches the standard formulation.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: NAMES (Personal Names in Law); ALIAS; PLEADING — PARTY IDENTIFICATION.