Most Popular Names
The most popular names in history in English for most of history
have been related to Christianity and the Bible. For both boys and girls these
popular names have not change much through time.
John was the most popular name in the U.S. in 1880. It is from
Hebrew and means God’s desire to help all people. John is the name of the
longest lived of Jesus’s 12 apostles. He was very devoted to Christ. There are
many variations of John as both surnames and given names in almost every
language, for example, Jan in Dutch, Janos in Czech and Johan in German.
By 1940, James was the most popular boy’s name. It is an English variation
on the name Jacob. It means to take the place of and was the name of a
cousin of Jesus. Today about 3% of men in the U.S. are named James.
In 1990, Michael became the most popular boy’s name with the
meaning of to resemble God. However recently, there has been a trend away
from biblical names. Today, Aiden is the most popular boy’s name. It comes
from Scotland and means fire.
In 1880, the most popular girls name was Mary. Mary comes from
Latin and means Star of the sea. Mary is a variation of Miriam which is a
Hebrew name. Mary is also the name of Jesus’s mother and girlfriend. It took
over 100 years for the name to loose popularity and be replaced by Jennifer.
Jennifer means beautiful one in Welsh. Since then, the most popular girl’s
name has change often with Sophia meaning wisdom being first in 2009.
Sophia is a good example of how names gain or loose popularity. In the 1940
it had dropped in popularity to
951st place before rising to
first place.
In 2012, the most popular
Japanese boys name was
Haruta, for girls Yui.