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French Baby Names: What’s next in Nice

French Baby Names: What’s next in Nice

In the past few weeks, you’ve seen our predictions for the rising names in the US, and Eleanor Nickerson’s forecast of what will be 2013’s most popular in the UK; today we look to France’s upcoming stars.

To check out the latest trends in French baby names, we turn once again to our go-to expert, Stéphanie Rapoport__, creator of the popular site meilleursprénoms.com and author of L’Officiel des Prénoms .  For anyone conversant in French, the site is filled with interesting lists, charts and analysis on French baby names
. But for those whose high school French is as shaky as mine, we asked Stéphanie to give us a recap en anglais.

When it comes to trends, one outstanding factor is that French baby names have never been shorter in length than they are today.  In 2013, I see few names having more than five letters and a profusion of names containing only three, such as Léa and Léo, Zoé and Tom.

Sounds are another major component of French naming style. Girl’s names ending in “a,” not surprisingly, dominate the scene, with nine of them holding the top twenty ranks. More interestingly, the “éo” sound is bouncing back for boys, thanks to Léo and the newcomer Timéo.

Baby names from the nineteenth century (Emma, Louise, Rose, Zoé, Louis, Jules, Léo) are riding a wave as they are internationally, and Old Testament names are on the rise, especially for the boys (Adam is new in France, Aaron, now in the Top 50, was unheard of before 2000, and both are rising fast. Nathan and Raphaël are relatively new and already in the Top 10.

Here now is our projection of what to expect in the Top 20 for 2013:

1. Emma

1. Nathan

2. Lola

2. Lucas

3. Chloé

3. Léo

4. Inès

4. Enzo

5. Léa

5. Louis

6. Jade

6. Gabriel

7. Manon

7. Jules

8. Louise

8. Timéo

9. Zoé

9. Hugo

10. Lilou

10. Arthur

11. Léna

11. Ethan

12. Sarah

12. Raphaël

13. Camille

13. Maël

14. Maëlys

14. Tom

15. Lina

15. Noah

16. Éva

16. Mathis

17. Louna

17. Théo

18. Clara

18. Adam

19. Alice

19. Nolan

20. Romane

20. Clément

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.