Dear Reader:
Early English names for Cubone and Clefairy have been discovered
Early Pokemon Names:
— Dr. Lava's Lost Pokemon (@DrLavaYT) April 16, 2020
Tons of info on Gen 1's localization leaked on /vp this week, including early English names. Some are pretty interesting, like Cubone & Clefairy originally being Orphon & Aria -- clear references to Cubone's dead mother and Clefairy's signature attack Sing. pic.twitter.com/5zlo0Jp3LX
New details on the original Pokemon games continues to release this week, as source code from those titles has been discovered. We learned of a Pokemon Pink that was possibly in development back in the day, and now we have early names for both Cubone and Clefairy.
According to the leaked data, Cubone was going to be called Orphon, and Clefairy was to be named Aria. As you can tell, those names were pretty on-the-nose for the backgrounds of the characters. I guess Nintendo and Pokemon Co. decided to go with names a bit more unique for the final release.