Names from the Arts and Pop Culture
By Sophie Kihm · Updated September 2026
Across 16 pages
of 16
French
"to lisp, stammer"
As modern as it sounds, Blaise is an ancient Christian martyr name. In Arthurian legend, Blaise is the name of Merlin the Magician's secretary. Its relation to the word and name Blaze gives it a…
English word name
"the quality of being just, impartial, or fair"
Justice, one of the rare virtue names for boys, entered the popularity ranks in 1992, and remained in the charts until the 2020s. While it has fallen out of favor in more recent years, it remains a…
English word and number name
This number name first came to public attention when Erykah Badu and Andre 3000 chose if for their son, Seven Sirius Benjamin, born in 1997. Over a decade later, David and Victoria Beckham used it as…
Diminutive of Sarah
"princess"
Sally is a cheerful, fresh-faced girl-next-door name that was originally a nickname for Sarah, but has long been used independently. Sally was popular in the eighteenth century and then again from…
Mineral and word name
This super-charged variation of Jett is on the rise -- along with the unlikely newcomer Jetson.
Hebrew
"pleasantness, charm, tenderness"
Noam is an underused modern Hebrew name with any number of attractive attributes attached to its meaning; it doesn't have the biblical weight of Noah, but could make a more distinctive alternative to…
Latin
"new"
Nova might be a much more commonly used a girls' name, but enough parents saw unisex appeal in it for it to debut on the US Top 1000 for boys in 2017. Nova is an astronomical term for a star that…
Word name
"gem stone; claw, nail"
Onyx is a fresh and trending gemstone name for boys, currently in the US Top 500, having climbed the charts rapidly since 2018. Now, an increasing number of girls are receiving the name, with a…
Swedish
"twinflower, lime tree"
Linnea is an attractive Scandinavian name that derives from the renowned 18th century Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus, who developed the Linnean system of classifying plants and animals. Linnea is…
English
"wood carver"
Carver is an occupational name with an artistic bent, associated with wood carving predominantly, though it could also be linked to those who carve from stone, marble, ice, and pumpkins. More…
"soft horse or pretty rose"
Rosalind has a distinguished literary history – used and popularized by Edmund Spenser and Shakespeare via one of his most charming heroines, in As You Like It . Along with a bouquet of other Rose…
Word name or diminutive of Lincoln
"ring, loop, connection; town by the pool"
Perhaps best associated today with the character from The Legend of Zelda game franchise, Link also has ties to the retro crime drama, The Mod Squad , to the presidential surname Lincoln, and of…
German and Scandinavian variation of Charles
Manly almost to the point of macho.
Roman mythology
"god of war; male; red planet"
Mars is a name with interesting potential, ticking the boxes as a mythological name, a space name, and a single syllable choice ending in -s. For parents wanting something unexpected, Mars could work…
Serbian from the Greek Nikolaos
"Victory of the people"
Nikola is generally masculine in Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Bulgaria and Macedonia, while in Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Slovakia, Estonia and the Czech Republic it is usually feminine. As a…
Nature name
Sky is an ambigender nature name that was first legitimized as the character of Sky Masterson in the 1950 musical Guys and Dolls , played in the film version by Marlon Brando. It's a name we…
"heaven"
A constellation name that could have broad appeal beyond astronomers and astrophysicists, Caelum blends the sounds of Scottish Callum and modern Caden. It comes from the Latin caelum meaning "heaven,…
Word name and variation of Axel, Scandinavian
"axle; father of peace"
Turns Axel into a word name.
Yiddish variation of Menachem
Mendel is an Old World Jewish name that is also the surname of the founder of genetics.
Greek
"flax"
Can Linus lose its metaphorical security blanket and move from the Peanuts page onto the birth certificate? We think it has enough charm and other positive elements going for it for the answer to be…
