Updated October 2026
Across 6 pages
of 6
Hebrew
"greatly praised"
Hillel the Great was a famous Talmudic scholar, the spiritual and ethical leader of his generation, and his name is greatly honored by parents in Israel and, to some extent, here.
English
"lives where hawthorn hedges grow"
The great American novelist sets this above many other surnames (and nature names , for that matter), but it's still an imposing and adventurous choice. Do nicknames Hawk or Thorne make it more…
English, Scottish, Irish surname
"mind, intellect; son of Aodh"
Part of the next generation of preppy H-beginning surnames. Once Harrison, Hudson, and Holden are no longer fresh, expect to hear more little boys being called Hughes, Hutch, and Henderson on the…
Hindu
"dark, tawny"
Familiar via Harry, but much more worldly.
Arabic variation of Aaron
"exalted, high"
This common Arabic name is related to Aaron, but feels far more distinctive in the US. Haroun Khalifa is the protagonist of Salman Rushdie's Haroun and the Sea of Stories .
Greek
"security, hostage, pledge"
Homer is a name of two halves, associated with the ancient Greek poet of the epic Odyssey and with the (often) doltish patriarch of The Simpsons . So does that make Homer a classic and scholarly…
Diminutive of Howard, English, Germanic, Norse
"high guardian; brave heart"
Old school Howard has fallen out of fashion in recent years, having been a Top 100 choice in the US from the 1880s until the 1960s. Short form Howie, however, might have more potential, with its…
Nature name
"hawk, a bird"
Animal names are on the rise, especially more of the aggressive Hawk-Fox-Wolf variety than cute little Bunnys or Robins, and Hawk is a prime example. Hawk is more commonly heard as a surname,…
Japanese
Heard most frequently in 18th century Japan, Hanzo is a rarity in modern culture. Hattori Hanzo was a legendary samurai of the Sengoku Era. A modern day namesake might be Hanzo Shimada, from the…
"spring tree"
Japanese writer Haruki Murakami, well known in the U. S. , might inspire some namesakes. Haruki is a popular Japanese name meaning spring tree or bright tree, a lovely nature meaning combined with…
Spanish
"the sun"
More familiar to English speakers in the Italian Elio form.
English word name
"a curve in three-dimensional space"
A scientific word name that would work wonderfully as a given name, given its similarity to Felix.
Nature name or Greek
"hero"
Heron may feel like a very usable nature name -- the heron is a long-legged wading bird -- but it was also the name of a 1st century Greek inventor and of an Egyptian saint. Highly unusual yet easy…
Scottish variation of James
"supplanter"
Just as Seamus/Seumus is Irish for James, Hamish is the Scottish form — one that's not often used here, but still redolent of Olde Scotland. If you're ready to go further than Duncan and Malcolm, out…
English place name derived from the Anglo-Norman personal name Hasten or Haesta, made famous by the battle of 1066.
Latin clan name
"timekeeper"
The ancient name Horace sounds fustily fuddy-duddy, and yet, with the resurrection of Homer, and the new interest in old Roman names...who knows. Its early popularity--it was in the Top 100 at the…
"someone who lives in a hollow; strong and hearty"
This name projects a sense of well-being, as in "hale and hearty", while also having a nature-adjacent meaning, referring to someone who lives near a hollow, a nook, or a remote area of land. Rhyming…
"the season for gathering in agricultural crops"
Harvest has been occasionally used as a name since the eighteenth century, originally as evenly unisex, though it tips a bit in the girls' direction in the contemporary US. Given the rise of such…
"widespread destruction or mayhem"
Havoc may be viewed in two ways: a violent boy name associated with widespread destruction and devastation, or a more playful choice, associated with mayhem and mischief, a more gentle kind of chaos.…
"heathery field"
Hemingway readers will recognize this as the name of Papa's first wife (and, eventually, actress Mariel's grandmother). But in Victorian times, Hadley and Hedley were actually more popular for boys.