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Q: Mr & Mrs Doe ( Answered,   5 Comments )
Question  
Subject: Mr & Mrs Doe
Category: Miscellaneous
Asked by: spaghettichef-ga
List Price: $4.00
Posted: 22 Apr 2002 14:36 PDT
Expires: 22 May 2002 14:36 PDT
Question ID: 2719
When an unidentified body shows up in a morgue in the US, we name them John Doe 
if they're a male and Jane Doe if they're a female. What do other countries 
name their unidentified bodies? Please list as many as possible.
Answer  
Subject: Re: Mr & Mrs Doe
Answered By: trailhead-ga on 23 Apr 2002 18:09 PDT
 
According to Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, “John Doe” first appeared 
in 1659 and is used to signify “1. a party to legal proceedings whose true name 
is unknown and 2. an average man”

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary
http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary

Guy-ga (See comment below) has tapped a good source for your question.  
Funny.com collected names from various patriots and posted them on the site.  
If you need clarification on them (some didn’t list both male and female 
names), funny.com placed the email address from those who provided the 
anonymous names.  

Here’s a list of names and the country they reside from.  

Country

Spanish- Fulano, Fulana
Chinese-  Zhang1 Shan1, LI3 Shi4
Indonesian- Si Polan
Hebrew- Ploni Almoni
Hindi- Anamika
Portugese- Zé Ninguém
Korean- Hong, Guil Dong
French- Jean Dupont
Ghana- Kwasi Mensa
Romanian- Necunoscut or Persoana Anonima
Swaziland- Sipho Nkosi
Finnish- Matti Meikalainen
Malay- Si Anu
Swedish- Medelsvensson
Dutch- Jan Modaal
Russian - Vasya Pupkin
German- Otto Normalverbraucher
Icelandic- Jón Jónsson

Web Sites that may interest you:

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary
http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary

Yahoo! Directory 
Humorous Names
http://dir.yahoo.com/Entertainment/Humor/Names/

Thanks,

Trailhead

Request for Answer Clarification by spaghettichef-ga on 04 May 2002 15:55 PDT
An impressive list of nationalities, but I would like both genders
represented in the answer.

Clarification of Answer by trailhead-ga on 07 May 2002 16:16 PDT
Hi spaghettichef,

Thanks for your clarification. Most of the names were taken from the
following page:

http://www.funnyname.com/anonymous.html 

Unfortunately, they didn't list both male and female.  However, if you
need clarification on this, funnyname.com placed the email address
from those who contributed to the list.  Feel free to email them and
ask them for both genders.

Please let me know if you need any other assistance,

Trailhead
Comments  
Subject: Re: Mr & Mrs Doe
From: davebug-ga on 22 Apr 2002 14:46 PDT
 
In China, the terms are "ZHANG1 Shan1" and "LI3 Shi4"
according to this source: http://www.princeton.edu/~acsspu/news/news3601.html

(I'm guessing the numbers after the words are the level of intonation used)
Subject: Re: Mr & Mrs Doe
From: guy-ga on 22 Apr 2002 16:16 PDT
 
http://www.funnyname.com/anonymous.html
Subject: Re: Mr & Mrs Doe
From: gertjan-ga on 23 Apr 2002 00:44 PDT
 
In Dutch: Jut (for male) and Jul (for female)
Subject: Re: Mr & Mrs Doe
From: jinjin-ga on 03 May 2002 07:06 PDT
 
In French, Dupont is the name of an average man, but I don't think it
would be used for a dead unknown soldier. For instance, the unknown
soldier saluted on each November 11th (and who represents all the
unknown soldiers dead during WW1) is just named "le soldat inconnu",
i.e. in English "the unknown soldier".
Subject: Re: Mr & Mrs Doe
From: cada-ga on 19 Jun 2002 19:11 PDT
 
In spanish fulano (fulana), zutano (sutana), mengano (mengana),
perencejo (male only) design unidentified people, but always in that
order: the first unknown is fulano, the second is zutano, the third is
mengano, and the last one is perencejo.
However, they are not proper names as John Doe or Jean Dupont, so they
are *not used* in legal documents to name unidentified people instead
of that the acronym NN is sometimes used (NN (m) for males and NN (f)
for females). I have no idea what NN stands for.

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