What's in a car's name?

By LARRY PRINTZ
The Virginian-Pilot

A perfect name summarizes a car's personality: Mustang, Ram, Impala. But the wrong one sends a message that an automaker never intended. The most famous example? The Chevrolet Nova, which means "it doesn't go" in Spanish.

Of course, such a thing couldn't happen today, right? Cracking open the dictionary reveals otherwise.

Take, for example, the Toyota Avalon. Once you know what the word Avalon refers to, you have to wonder what possessed a car company to name its sedan after a mythical Celtic island of the dead.

Increasingly, automakers are avoiding proper words in naming their vehicles to sidestep such unintended consequences. Still, countless hours - not to mention millions of dollars - are spent by manufacturers to come up with the perfect moniker.

And names matter.

Just look at Ford. The company is hoping to stoke interest in the full-sized Five Hundred sedan by renaming it the Taurus for 2008.

Here then, is a sampling of current model names, their definitions and the automaker who uses them: