What’s in a Daughter’s Name? A Poem for a Child with the Madonna’s Name

Abstract

Lullaby poems with the name of Mary, mother of Jesus, given to a child’s name are unusual Even rarer are children named after such poems. An overlooked case in the psychoanalytic literature in which Beer-Hofmanns poem, Schlaflied fur Miriam, served as the basis for the naming of a child born in New York, of European parents, is briefly underscored.