In this paper Luc van Doorslaer explains how a proper name’s connotations are mainly culturally defined and how those connotations are most specific at the place where the name functions best. The wider the geographical and linguistic the gap, the more general the connotations become. The translator is therefore faced with a number of questions: should he keep the name of the source language, should he adapt the name according to the spelling and phonological rules of the target language or should he choose a name that displays the same etymological meaning as the name in the source language? Basing himself on R. Zimmer (1981), van Doorslaer distinguishes between common nouns and proper nouns, embodied and disembodied names, identifiable and non-identifiable names. He examines how the translation problem of names is solved in the German translations of Felix Timmermans.