Abner

AB-ner

Hebrew

"father of light."

Updated Thu Mar 20 2025

Abner Origin and Meaning

The name Abner is a boy's name of Hebrew origin meaning "father of light.".

This neglected Biblical name--it was the name of the commander of Saul's army and appears twice in the New Testament--is ready to flee Dogpatch. It was regularly used in the nineteenth century, but was pretty much demolished by the long-running hillbilly comic strip L'il Abner, which began in 1934 and ran through 1977. A more respectable namesake is Abner Doubleday, who has been credited with inventing baseball.

Abner also has literary credentials, having appeared in works by James Fenimore Cooper, Thomas Hardy and Eugene O'Neill.

# 997 in the US

Abner Rank in US Top 1000

# 778 on Nameberry

Abner Rank in Nameberry Top 1000

Popularity of the name Abner

997US2023
778Nameberry2025
113Unique2022
773Future2028

20 Names Similar to Abner

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Famous People Named Abner

Abner Doubleday
U.S. Civil War general; rumored to have invented baseball
Abner Biberman
American actor and director
Abner Nash
American politician; 2nd Governor of North Carolina
Abner Haynes
American NFL football player
Abner Joseph Mikva
U.S. Congressman and White House counsel
Abner Frank Dalrymple
American baseball player
Abner Monroe Perrin
U.S. Civil War general
Abner Wilcox
American missionary to Hawaii
(Abner) Linwood Holton Jr.
American politician; 61st Governor of Virginia

The name Abner in Pop Culture

Li'l Abner Yokum
main character in comic strip "Li'l Abner" by Al Capp
Abner
pet pig on animated series "Hey Arnold!"
Abner Kravitz
character on TV's "Bewitched"
Abner Hale
character in James Michener's "Hawaii"
Abner Ronald Jenkins
character in Marvel Comics
Abner Brown
character in John Masefield's "The Box of Delights"