To-day I stumbled upon a treasure—the Wikipedia article of an obscure historical figure by the curious name of Sir Pryce Pryce-Jones.

Sir Pryce Pryce-Jones was a nineteenth-century Welsh businessman who formed the first mail-order business, revolutionising how products were sold. That’s not what we are here to talk about to-day, because there’s something endlessly more amusing: his name is Sir Pryce Pryce-Jones.

Yes, that’s right: his first name is repeated in his last name.

At first I envisioned a Lord and Lady Pryce-Jones, strolling on the grounds of their manor, deciding what to name their child.

“For the last time, we are absolutely not naming him Gruffydd,” says Lady Pryce-Jones.

Lord Pryce-Jones furrows his brow. “But what else goes well with Pryce-Jones?”

Lady Pryce-Jones fiddles with her parasol, lost in thought, as a wind ripples through the branches of the old oak and the last syllables of her husband’s query echo through her mind. Pryce, Jones, Pryce, Jones. “Pryce,” she finally says.

“Pryce?” cries the lord. “As in Pryce … Pryce-Jones?”

“Yes,” she asserts. “I insist.”

My first fantasy is punctured by a line in Sir Pryce Pryce-Jones’ biography box. Born Pryce Jones, 16 October 1834, Llanllwchaiarn, Wales.

What? His name at birth was not Pryce Pryce-Jones, but merely Pryce Jones? Why, the plot thickens! How does a man born Pryce Jones decide to reinvent himself as Pryce Pryce-Jones?

My second fantasy:

“Next!” calls the clerk at the registry.

A boyish nineteen-year-old, the ink still fresh on his boarding school diploma, steps up to the window. The clerk lifts a monocle. “Name?”

“Pryce Jones, sir.”

“First name?”

“Er, Pryce, sir.”

The clerk scribbles something in longhand into a record book. “Welcome to London, Mr. Pryce Pryce-Jones,” he says.

“But wait,” Pryce says, “my name is just—”

“Next!” calls the clerk.

But the rest of the Wikipedia article is strangely silent on the subject of when and how exactly Pryce Jones came to style his name as if it were Dance Dance Revolution.

My guess is that it was a social climbing thing. Perhaps Pryce Jones started out small and ordinary, but when he saw that his mail-order revolution was taking off, attracting royalty among his clients, he also saw an opportunity to initiate himself into a more refined social class. A rich man ought to have a rich man’s name, he may have thought. And rich men have hyphenated names, but I don’t, he may have thought. Sir Pryce Pryce-Jones it is.