TEAM EXPLOSIVE YOUTH! HASSHIN!!

[Evil Midnight Lurker]

It's now later.
The relevant kanji: On-reading "gan," kun-reading "maru," "marui," "marumeru."
1 (a) round body, pellet, ball
(b) round projectile, ball
gan'yaku pill
hougan cannonball
dangan shot, bullet, shell
juugan bullet
(2) suffix after name of pills
kyuumeigan Kyuumei pill
Kun: maru (1)
1 (a) round or spherical shape
(b) circle
hinomaru Rising Sun Flag
2 wholeness, completeness
maru no mama whole, in its entirety
maru de just like; completely, perfectly
3 check mark for correct answers
maru o tsukeru mark a correct answer with a circle
4 small circle corresponding to a circle in a sentence
5 within the castle walls
ni no maru outworks of a castle
honmaru keep, donjon
maru (2)
1 (in compounds) round, circular, spherical
marugao round face, moon face
marumaru to futotta plump, rotund, chubby
2 (also prefix) complete(ly), total(ly), perfect(ly)
marumaru completely, entirely
marumouke clear profit
marufutsuka for a full two days
maruyake ni natta completely burned
3 suffix after names of ships--formerly also used after names of swords, children or dogs
nankaimaru Nankaimaru (ship's name)
hiyoshimaru name of Toyotomi Hideyoshi during his youth
...which does explain how it can be a personal name suffix, but doesn't go very far explaining why it's a name suffix to begin with. I suspect it's the "perfection" connotation, but there could be more than my character dictionary's telling me.
Hope this helped,
--Sam
"I weave a lethal net of baked goods that few can escape."