"Minnie"??? what's that short for?

[ThrelfallYorky]

Recently cam upon the name "Minnie" for a child - apart from "Minerva", which sounds unlikely for a working-class mob in N of England in 19thC - what could it be short for? Surely it couldn't be a name in its own right (Unless you're a Mouse, of course).

[Milliepede]

I think it's short for Minnie Ha Ha 

[miriamkinga]

My gran's best friend was Mary but was always known as "Minnie".

[Manchester Rambler]

Minnie was originaly a Scottish pet form of Mary, but it became a popular name in its own right in Victorian England.  It can also be a short form of Wilhelmina.  I have several Minnies (not short for anything) in my own tree.

[JonathanC]

My great-grandmother was Williamina but was known as Minnie.  Her fifth child was christened Minnie.  Both in Glasgow, Scotland.

[LizzieW]

My mother in law was called Minnie, but that was the name she was baptised as, so not short for anything and, Milliepede, she was certainly not a Minnie ha ha, quite the opposite.

[ThrelfallYorky]

Thanks for those ideas - haven't found her birth records yet, or baptism, can't believe she'd be a Wilhelmina, again, too fancy to fit in with the names of the rest of the mob - but on censuses up she pops as "Minnie". None of them quite fit - there's another child "Mary" so that pet name's not likely - and on that line there doesn't seem to be a Scottish influence. Just really can't seriously imagine calling a child that!

[Milliepede]

When was she born and where so we can help with a birth?

[ThrelfallYorky]

Someone's just given me something that sounds very likely - it fits in with others, too, in the generation above : MIRIAM! Off to see if it's right.....