Cat Inspired Names

Gently old-fashioned stand-alone nickname that owes its popularity to mega popular Abigail.

Allie is one short form that's gotten so popular it's often used as a name on its own. Cute, friendly, yet we'd recommend using one of the proper names such as Alice to give your daughter an option.

Artemis, one of the key figures of the female Greek pantheon, is the ancient virgin goddess of the hunt, wilderness, animals, childbirth, and a protector of young girls, later associated with the moon. Artemis is the equivalent to the Roman Diana, but a fresher and more distinctive, if offbeat, choice.

Aslan, derived from the Old Turkic word arslan, meaning "lion," is best known in the West as the name of the heroic lion in C.S. Lewis' "Chronicles of Narnia" series, who serves as an allegorical stand-in for Jesus Christ. It was also used as a positive epithet for several Turkish emperors in the Middle Ages.

A word name with fashionable o-ending that has associations with both the homespun fabric and the mottled cat. Alice Cooper named his daughter Calico decades ago.

May be the most modern, stylish Catherine nickname: more unusual than Kate or Cate, with an animal and word name edge. Cat Power is a trendy folksinger.

If your ancestry is Italian, you may want to consider this elegant twist on a classic.

Several animal names, from Fox to Wolf and even to Tiger, ccan work, but Cougar should stay in its cage. Even John Mellencamp has dropped it.

Diana, the tragic British princess, inspired many fashions, but strangely, not one for her name. For us, Diana is a gorgeous and still-underused choice.

As the song says, "Dinah, is there anyone finer?" Dinah is a charming, underused Old Testament name with a rich literary and musical resume.

This Top 100 girls' name in The Netherlands is unlikely to translate to the U.S., where it would undoubtedly pronounced fee-line and mistaken for the adjective that means cat-like. While the name Feline -- and Felina and Felinus -- do have the same root, the considerably more charming pronunciation in modern-day Europe is fee-LEEN-ah. Some websites mistakenly relate it to Felix and give its meaning as happy or fortunate.

Felix is one of those ancient but nontraditional names for boys that have come into favor over the past few decades, a favorite of parents who want a masculine name with history and heft that breaks ranks with the standard Franks and Freds. Felix is also an international darling, ranking in the Top 100 in several European and English-speaking countries.

Despite the presidential pedigree, it's still hard to shake the image of the cartoon cat (named after his creator Jim Davis's grandfather). However, there are other Garfields, such as Barbadian cricket player Sir Garfield Sobers, who carries it with gravitas.

Joining the likes of Coco and Fifi, Gigi has a style but some may feel it lacks substance. Model and TV personality Gigi Hadid (born Jelena) has likely drawn attention to this name, while designer Cynthia Rowley may have inspired parents to use it as a given name by choosing it for her daughter.

Grrrr.

We're hearing Kat more and more being used by Katherines who are tired of Kathy, Kate and Katie. Katti or Kattie is another possibility.

This endearing nickname name is one Katherine pet form that predates all the Kathys and Katies, having been fairly common in the eighteenth century. With the current mini-craze for animal-related names, Kitty is sounding cute and cuddly again—she's already jumped back onto the U.K. list, at number 199.

Leo is a strong-yet-friendly name that was common among the Romans, used for thirteen popes, and is now at its highest point ever in the US thanks in part to Leonardo "Leo" DiCaprio.