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Aristocrats used the three names (praenomen, nomen, cognomen), while lesser Romans often just used the first two.

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The praenomen was usually one of just a very few names (10 or so, as I recall)- and Marcus is the only one that sounds remotely usuable today, so that's what modern authors inevitably use for sympathetic characters. First-born sons were almost invariably given their father's praenomen. A Nomen is like a surname, and the final cognomen designated a particular branch of the family (like a double-barrelled surname today) or in the rare case of a prominent politician or whatever, an honorific.

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Women's names were just the feminine form of their husband or fathers' nomen, for the most part, with "maior" or "minor" or prima, secunda, tertia etc.

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The common Roman Praenomen were Marcus, Gaius, Gnaeus, Publius, Lucius (loo-key-us in latin, not loo-shus), Titus, Quintus, Sextus, Decimus...that's about it for what I remember.

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This link has much information, though it's a little old (from a 1905 ish textbook- very famous!)
http://www.forumromanum.org/life/johnston_2.html#41

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sa

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