Grimes reveals real meaning behind X Æ A-12's name

6 May 2020, 14:07

By Katie Louise Smith

Grimes explained the meaning of the baby's name on Twitter, but people still don't know how to pronounce it.

From the moment Grimes announced her pregnancy with Elon Musk via a NSFW photoshoot on Instagram, the world knew that the baby would have one of the most unique names in the world.

Yesterday (May 5), that prediction came true, but the newborn baby's name was beyond anything any of us could have ever predicted.

Announced by Musk on Twitter, the baby (which Grimes said will grow up to decide their own gender) has been bestowed with the name X Æ A-12 Musk. Yes, really. Grimes was right when she said "everyone’s gonna make fun of" the name because it was "too avant-garde".

Taking to Instagram to confirm the news, Grimes revealed exactly what the meaning behind the name is.

What does X Æ A-12 mean?

X stands for "the unknown variable", the one that we all tried to find the value of in maths class.

Æ is "my elven spelling of Ai". AI is also short for 'Artificial Intelligence' and Ai in some languages also means love.

And A-12 is "precursor to SR-17", Grimes and Musk's favourite aircraft. The Lockheed A-12's internal code name is Archangel. Grimes elaborated on the reasoning, saying: "No weapons, no defenses, just speed. Great in battle, but non-violent."

Grimes also said Archangel is her favourite song. She also has a song called '4ÆM' on her recent album, Miss Anthropocene.

The metal rat is believed to be in honour of the baby's Chinese zodiac. 2020 is the Year of the Rat and and the year's element is metal.

How do you pronounce X Æ A-12?

Neither Grimes nor Musk have elaborated on the exact pronunciation of of the baby's name just yet, but based on the information in Grimes' tweet, here's what we reckon:

X is pronounced X, obviously.

While some believed Æ to be pronounced like the 'ah' sound in cat, or 'ash' as the Latin ligature is known in the English language, Grimes' explanation behind the meaning could mean it's pronounced 'eye', like the Chinese word for love, 'Ai' (爱).

Assuming the A in A-12 stands for Archangel, it's possible that A-12 could just be Archangel-12.

Twitter users have come up with multiple theories about the pronunciation of the name including an explanation of how it could mean 'Xavier', but Musk already has a son with that exact name so who knows?

But anyway, congrats to Grimes and Elon on their healthy baby! Please put us out of our misery with the pronunciation update soon x