Updated November 2023
Across 17 pages
of 17
English place name from Dutch
"sea land"
Sunny and energetic, but with a hint of cool cowboy, Zealand has been sparingly used since the 2000s, Zealand but shot up the charts in 2021 after YouTube family The Labrants gave it to their son the…
River name, color name, or variation of Niall, Irish
"champion"
Water names are a cool category these days, and this one of the famous Egyptian river is no exception. It streamlines the fussier Niles and also may be thought of as a color name, meaning dark blue…
English, place name meaning "bright town"
"bright town"
Brighton has long been known as a holiday resort town on the south coast of England. A cheery unisex name, it was used for his daughter by Jon Favreau, but was a boy on the TV show The Nanny .
Animal name or diminutive of Wolfgang, German
" traveling wolf"
Wolf is a name with a split personality. It can be seen as one of the fierce animal names, like Fox and Bear and Puma, with a touch of the werewolf, or it can be viewed as a quieter, Wolf Blitzer…
Word name or variation of Amon
Brother for Heaven or Nevaeh.
Turkish form of Zaynab, Arabic
"beauty; fragrant tree"
Pretty and strong, Zeynep is one of the most popular girl names in Turkey, where it has ranked in the Top 10 for more than 40 years — half of which it has spent in the very top spot. Familiar in The…
English surname
"one who lives on the hillside or riverbank"
Banks as a girls' name was brought into the lexicon by actress Hilary Duff and musician Matthew Koma, who chose it for their daughter, Banks Violet. As both a surname and a word name, Banks refers to…
Latin, from ancient place name Lavinium
Lavinia is a charmingly prim and proper Victorian-sounding name which actually dates back to classical mythology, where it was the name of the wife of the Trojan hero Aeneas, who was considered the…
Sanskrit
"one who has accomplished a goal"
Siddhartha Gautama was one of the real names of Buddha, making this an impressive and weighty name among the Buddhist community. Among Hindis, Siddharth is strongly associated with the Brahmin caste.…
Word name or diminutive of Regina, Latin
"queen"
Has an old-time country feeling, perhaps due to Ma Rainey, considered the "Mother of the Blues". This is the most popular spelling of the name, given to about 50 girls last year, with half as many…
Japanese place name or Celtic
"happy"
Soft, simple, and far more unusual than Tara or Farrah. As a Japanese place name, it's been used occasionally as a surname and is beginning to be used as a first. Nara is also the name of a Hindu…
Malay, Cuban; "hay; place name"
"hay; place name"
Latin, from a Roman family name related to Mars, the god of war
Marius, frequently heard in Germany and France, is a slightly fusty yet accessible name that has (Les Mis) to Anne Rice. With the rise in interest in such Latin names as Maximus and Atticus, Marius…
English animal name
Sable is often associated with the Dynsaty soap opera, but it is actually a type of animal historically hunted for its fur. Sable is also used as a word for a warm, rich black color. Both…
Latin clan name
"soft; thresher"
A name that seems to hail from the old Irish neighborhoods of Boston and New York, Terence actually dates back a lot further, to the time of a famous second-century poet, who started life as a North…
English word name or nickname
"two"
Basketball's Jayson Tatum introduced this to the naming lexicon when he used it as a clever nickname for his son, Jayson Christoper Jr. It fits in with nicknames like Trey or Trip for boys who are…
Italian, diminutive of any name ending in -dino
Italian heritage name. It's sweet and simple, but has fallen almost out of use since its heyday in the 1960s.
Nature name and surname, English
"rivers"
The name Rivers combines two major trends: nature names like the popular River itself, and S-ending surname-names such as Brooks, Rhodes, and yes, Rivers. Rivers is most notable as a first name via…
English combination of Lily + Beth or diminutive of Elizabeth, Hebrew
"pledged to God"
Queen Elizabeth's childhood nickname was Lilibet, the name of Prince Harry and Meghan's newborn daughter, and Lilibeth has the same kind of lilting charm. While many combo names are less attractive…
Topographical name or short form of Clifford or Clifton
Cliff is a familiar, timeless short form -- never too popular, yet widely known -- that you might also think of as a geographical name ala Vale or Field.