International Baby Names
By Sophie Kihm · Updated September 2026
Across 20 pages
of 20
Native American, Omaha
"yellow bird"
Though unrelated, this would probably be taken as a fanciful spelling of Patsy.
Native American, Hopi
"clear water"
A sweet and clear Hopi name with a lovely natural meaning to match.
English or Mapuche
"villager, country-dweller; blue"
The y helps a bit, but still a painful image.
Native American, Lakota
"medicine"
An Indigenous name with a healing meaning.
Native American, Blackfoot,or Greek, "golden eagle, or rock, stone"
"golden eagle, or rock, stone"
Too tightly tied to the acronym for the activist group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
Native American
"rock, stone"
This spelling variation of Peta, chosen by Ani DiFranco for her daughter, might be a little difficult to pull off. Alternative suggestions: Petra and Petal.
"silver creek"
Olympic skier Picabo Street was allowed to choose her name at the age of three, and picked it possibly (a) after a nearby Idaho town or (b) because she loved to play peekaboo. No longer a…
Inuit
"she who is up on high"
In Inuit Indigenous American culture, Pinga is a goddess of the hunt and of medicine, heavily associated with the sky.
Mapuche
"snow"
"to snow"
Cree
"thunder"
A powerful Cree nature-related word turned name.
Algonquin
"playful one"
Seen from our vantage point, Pocahontas is a name that will please no one. It's sure to invite playground mockery, and parents without Algonquin ancestry will be engaging in cultural appropriation.…
Choctaw, Native American
"bow"
Although it looks and sounds like the Spanish name Paloma, meaning "dove," Poloma has Native American origins from the Choctaw tribe.
Native American, Algonquin
"powwow hill"
Powhatan is identified with the powerful chief and father of Pocahontas; not likely to be adopted by others.
Inuktitut
"root"
A name of Inuit origin with a grounded meaning.
Native American, Comanche
"sweet smelling, fragrant"
Name of a major figure in Indigenous history, Quanah Parker, a Comanche chief who became a judge on the Court of Indian Affairs. Quanah is derived from the Comanche word kwana , meaning "odor" or…
"fragrant"
Model and activist Quannah Chasinghorse has Hän Gwich’in and Oglala Lakota ancestry, but her name originally comes from the Comanche Nation. In Comanche, kwana means "odor" or "smell". A famous male…
Nahuatl, Native American
"feathered snake"
The creator god of the sky, wind, and knowledge in Aztec mythology, also associated with the morning star. In Mesoamerican myth Quetzalcoatl is also a mythical hero from whom almost all Mesoamerican…
"feather, precious thing"
A rare and lovely Nahuatl name, which literally means "quetzal feather" – a quetzal is a beautiful green bird native to Mexico, Guatemala and South America. The word is figuratively used to refer to…
