Menu

The Clementine Clique: Trendy names ending in ‘ine’

The Clementine Clique: Trendy names ending in ‘ine’

Here at nameberry, we’ve been known to scrutinize trends down to a single letter (are V names in?) or syllable (la-beginnings) or sound (oo), as in Talllulah.  The other day, thinking about  the names that are emerging as as among the hottest for girls right now, I suddenly realized that several of them have something in common–and that is that they are all three-syllable names ending in the suffix ine:

ADELINE

CLEMENTINE

EMMELINE

EVANGELINE

GERALDINE

JOSEPHINE

OTTOLINE

This is a pattern that hasn’t been seen in the US for a long time–if you don’t count classics like Caroline and Madeline.  The ones that are feminizations of boys’ names, such as Geraldine and Ernestine, fell out of favor at a time when a) women didn’t want to be thought of as appendages of men even in their names, and b) the particular male names they derived from were sounding particularly fusty.

But this doesn’t seem like such a burning feminist issue these days, when many parents are  eager to honor their dads and forefathers as namesakes for their kids of either gender.  And besides–who knows?–names like Gerald and Ernest could make a return at any time.

The ine ending is one of the most popular in French female nomenclature, and there are any number of attractivee choices that have hardly been heard in America.  Looking through the French livre des prenoms*, we find, for example:

ALBERTINE (of Proustian fame)

AMANDINE

AMELINE

ANTONINE

CAPUCINE  (possibly too Starbucks)

CELESTINE

FIDELINE

FLORENTINE

HONORINE

JEREMINE

LAURELINE

LAZARINE

LEONTINE

NATALINE

ODELINE

OMBELINE

SERAPHINE

SEVERINE

THOMASINE

VICTORINE

ZEPHYRINE

There are also an equal number of Gallic two-syllable ine names, which are worlds away from the old-style Frenchy and Irish ine/een names — Maxine, Arlene, Darlene, Marlene, Eileen, etal– used here a generation or two ago.  Par example:

BELLINE

DAUPHINE

DELPHINE

FRANZINE

GEORGINE

JENSINE

JUSTINE

MARTINE

ONDINE

PERRINE

QUENTINE

SANDRINE

SATINE

VIVINE

YVELINE*Please note that many of these French names have accents, but unfortunately we haven’t figured out a way yet of inserting them without compromising the data base. Stay tuned.

About the Author

Linda Rosenkrantz

Linda Rosenkrantz

Linda Rosenkrantz is the co-founder of Nameberry, and co-author with Pamela Redmond of the ten baby naming books acknowledged to have revolutionized American baby naming. You can follow her personally at InstagramTwitter and Facebook. She is also the author of the highly acclaimed New York Review Books Classics novel Talk and a number of other books.