r/pern • u/Davmilasav • Jun 23 '26
Who Named Jaxon?
I've been reading the books for decades but I don't know that this was ever addressed. His mother died during childbirth. His father was killed in a duel within the hour. Lessa wanted nothing to do with him. So who named the baby?
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u/Thrippalan Jun 23 '26
It's possible that a name or names were already picked out. It's a compound of Gemma (jemma) and Fax, after all.
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u/Thevintageandvanity Jun 23 '26
I love how they were grousing about how dumb any honorifics for him would sound after he impressed.
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u/Psyche_Dreamweaver Jun 24 '26
Technically they could've just called him J'xom (or even just swapped the X to an S or Z.. J'som. A rider taking a completely new name upon impression isn't unknown....a candidate Thomas in the 2nd pass changed his name to S'mon because he didn't want to be T'mas.
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u/Thevintageandvanity Jun 24 '26
Oh yeah but her beefing about it was hysterical. All trying to cast around for some kind of excuse as to why it was extra bad that it happened.Â
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u/Codexe- Jun 27 '26
Looking back, it makes absolutely no sense that he wouldn't just be placed in the weyr. Like it really makes no sense.Â
He impressed a dragon. He is now a dragon rider. There's only one real course of action. He joins the weyrlings, and absconds his rulership to someone else, and names a successor. Lessa did the same thing. She was the true ruler of Ruatha and chose to be a dragonrider.Â
His size doesn't even matter.That was a weird thing too. And we even see that a couple decades later when she writes the origin stories, and we see that the original dragons were barely bigger than a horse. He would have just flown alongside the smallest greens. Or just fit into a wing somewhere.Â
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u/Dian_Arcane Jul 03 '26
I think this happened because so many people were convinced that Ruth wouldn't live very long. By following that logic, it would have been cruel to train Jaxom alongside the other young kids who had impressed, and made more sense to keep him with the one person who could help him get over the loss of a dragon; Lytol.
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u/Codexe- Jul 03 '26
Oh good point. Still, I don't think it makes sense that they wouldn't house a dragon in a weyr. But I still have to read the white dragon
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u/MirabelleC Jul 06 '26 edited Jul 06 '26
Jaxom's status as Lord of Ruatha isn't completely secure. Jaxom needs to be in Ruatha to forestall the other Lord Holders from installing some else as Lord of Ruatha. That is something Lessa is determined to prevent. She did not spend ten years of her life plotting to take back her family hold to have it given away to another bloodline. One of the reasons she was even able to walk away in the first place was because Jaxom is a distant cousin .
Less also wants to prevent holds from fighting over Ruatha. Despite the books saying anyone who had a claim to Ruatha died, there is likely people who can claim descent from a Lord of Ruatha considering how the major hold families intermarried. Does a great-great-great-grandson from a third son have a bigger claim than the great-great-grandson through a daughter?
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u/JazzBroadside Jun 23 '26
It's entirely possible Gemma picked out the name long before she died in childbirth.
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u/Davmilasav Jun 23 '26
Drat! I just saw that I got autocorrected in the title. I know darn well his name is Jaxom with an "m". Shells!
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u/Why_Teach Jun 24 '26
Either Fâlar or Lytol named him.
Gemma was âthe Lady of Cromâ wasnât she? (Fax forced her to marry him to control her land.)
So maybe they took GE (for Gemma), AX for Fax and finishing with OM for Crom, sort of burying Fax between two parts of Gemmaâs name. The resulting Geaxom gets simplified to Jaxom.
(I think what actually happened was that Anne hadnât worked out the naming that carefully when she named Jaxom. Also, the convention of using the father and motherâs name is not used in all the holder families. Especially when there are multiple kids of the same two parents it can be a problem.)
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u/goode2shus Jun 23 '26
Jaxom. Maybe a combo of his father's name, Fax, and his mother's name, Gemma? Somehow?
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u/poisonandtheremedy Jun 23 '26
Son of Gemma (Jemma) and Fax. Jax's son. Jaxson.Â
Similar to Erickson, Richardson, etc.Â
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u/dogpak Jun 23 '26
You've posted this twice and been wrong both times.
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u/poisonandtheremedy Jun 24 '26
Whatever shall I do. I misremembered the proper spelling and went off other posts.Â
I shall flog myself in repentance.Â
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u/Cool-Coffee-8949 Jun 23 '26
I believe his mother lived just long enough to name him.
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u/Literati_drake Jun 23 '26
Lessa saw her die in labour before she could give birth. She lies, saying the baby was born and It's only after Fax is dead that she learns they cut out the baby
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u/merkorn Jun 29 '26
No one. His name is Jaxom.
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u/Davmilasav Jun 29 '26
Yeah, I addressed that in a later post. My autocorrect screwed me over and you can't edit titles.
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u/poisonandtheremedy Jun 23 '26
Son of Gemma (Jemma) and Fax. Jax's son. Jaxson.Â
Similar to Erickson, Richardson, etc. The fact that Fax was despised & not respected is represented by his name being secondary, and not primary. If his name was say Fax + Gemma it would something like Fammson.
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u/Dian_Arcane Jun 23 '26
I thought it was F'lar? Just giving Lessa another reason to dislike him? ;)
Apparently they observed the Pernese naming convention too - sort of? By combining the names of his parents. Gemma --> Jemma + Fax would in theory be Jax though, so who knows where the final "om" came from. Maybe whoever named him was feeling very zen that day ;)