We all know that Lucas just makes up some of the names from different things like R2, Chewbacca, 3-po etc.
Jar Jar was named by his son.
But he DOES take a lot of the names from various langauges and mythology.
SKYWALKER - Is what the Greeks used to call their Gods. "Skywalkers" because they walked in the sky.
BOSS NASS - Is slavic for the BOSS OF US
SITH - In Scottish folklore there is a BOABHAN SITH which has different meaning depending on which part of the country you're in. Some of these meanings are "dark fairy", "evil and malevolant being", and here's the killer "dark hooded evil spirit".
Lucas spent years researching Star Wars. It wasn't just thrown together in a couple of weeks.
Some of the names are made up but others have meaning towards there characters.
I don't know if anyone has mentioned this yet, but qui-gon jinn has words in it from other languages. Qui is ghost in japanese, and jinn is genie is some arabic language. But I think he's just pulling words from his vast anthropologic background. Lucas knows a ton of myths from all over the world. He probably has some mean something for an inside joke with himself, but doesn't intend them for the audience. If anything, the name sources just serve to show his influences. The whole qui thing probably came from all the Kurasawa (i butchered that one) pictures he loves. I think the Sith names are much more simple than that. Sidious obviously comes form INSIDIOUS which is his whole character. And i agree with all the posts about them simply being scary words associated with death and destruction since he wants those emotions evoked in the audience when the hear them.
I’m still to be convinced either way to whether or not meaning as been put into GL names but I think is a bit of a coincidence to say that none of the names have meaning when a lot of the names do resemble there characters, a lot of writers name there characters after something in there life or with something meaningful(look at the matrix for a major count of this), I very much doubt that GL put thought into every character, but I do think that you have to be open minded about the possibility of him doing it for some characters, on the other hand I very much doubt that there was no thought put into some of the names, he is a clever man and probably put some meaning into some of the names, probably things he already knew with out having to research.
To round it up I don’t think you can put everything down to coincidence that’s probably as unlikely as him putting meaning into every name, I think people have to be a bit open minded.
Regards godfather
Originally posted by Cascador
No, Jedi, comes from Jidai, a samoerai clan
Well, the translation is coming from my Indian friend, and I know for a fact that somewhere in the world (and I'm pretty darn sure it's india), there's an actual Jedi Academy. I seriously doubt that place is teaching the ways of the Force.