Classic Names

Names that have never really left. They rise and fall within a band rather than disappearing, which makes them the safest choice on the site and the hardest to say anything surprising about.

Rankings for

49 names, rare — 25 to 99 a year, in United States

Very Rare Rare Uncommon

Girls Boys Unisex

Antoine Antoine is a boy's name from the Roman family name Antonius, the French form of Anthony.
Boy French 95 in 2025
Gerard Gerard is a boy's name from Germanic elements meaning brave with the spear.
Boy Germanic 95 in 2025
Fredrick Fredrick is an American respelling that ranks higher in England and Wales than in the United States — 934th against 1730th, which reverses the usual direction for a respelling.
Boy English 94 in 2025
Roderick Roderick means famous ruler, and its most consequential bearer lost a country — Roderic was the last Visigothic king of Spain, defeated in 711 by the Arab and Berber force that then held most of the peninsula for centuries.
Boy German 93 in 2025
Laurence Laurence is the one name on this site that changes sex at the Channel: it is a man's name in English and a woman's name in French.
Unisex Latin 98 in 2025
Morris Morris means dark-skinned, from the Latin for a Moor — and the morris dance carries the same word, having been thought to imitate Moorish dancing when it reached England.
Boy English 92 in 2025
Stephan Stephan means a wreath, not a crown — stephanos was the woven victor's garland at the Greek games, which is why the first Christian martyr's name reads as a prize rather than a rank.
Boy German 86 in 2025
Clifton Clifton means the settlement by the cliff, and it is the same first element as Clifford — one describes a ford below the cliff and the other the farm on top of it.
Boy English 82 in 2025
Alexandre Alexandre is a boy's name of Greek origin meaning "defender of mankind," the French form of Alexander.
Boy French 67 in 2025
Tom Tom is a boy's name of Aramaic origin meaning "twin," a short form of Thomas used as a full name across Europe.
Boy Aramaic 65 in 2025
Clément Clément is a boy's name of Latin origin meaning "merciful" or "gentle," borne by fourteen popes and by one of the earliest Christian writers outside the New Testament.
Boy French 62 in 2025
Caitlin Caitlin is a girl's name of Greek origin, the Irish form of Katherine, and its English mispronunciation generated a whole family of new names.
Girl Irish 78 in 2025
Herman Herman means army man, and the German national hero Hermann is a Latin scribe's version of a Cheruscan name we cannot now recover — Arminius, the chief who destroyed three Roman legions in AD 9.
Boy Germanic 58 in 2025
Lino Lino is a boy's name of Greek origin from Linus, a figure Greek myth killed off twice in different stories.
Boy Italian 57 in 2025
Sébastien Sébastien is a boy's name meaning from Sebaste, a city whose own name means venerable — it renders the imperial title Augustus into Greek.
Boy French 55 in 2025
Stuart Stuart means steward, and the office was literally the sty warden — keeper of the pigs — which rose to run the royal household and then supplied the name of a dynasty.
Boy Scottish 53 in 2025
Olivier Olivier is a boy's name usually taken as olive tree, though the character who made it famous — Roland's companion in the Song of Roland — may carry a Norse name meaning elf army instead.
Boy French 52 in 2025
Marius Marius is a boy's name of Latin origin, a Roman family name usually connected to Mars, the god of war.
Boy French 52 in 2025
Diane Diane is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "divine" or "heavenly," the French form of the Roman goddess Diana.
Girl French 66 in 2025
Herbert Herbert is a boy's name from Germanic elements meaning bright army.
Boy Germanic 49 in 2025
Jan Jan is 66 percent female in our records because two unrelated uses collide — it is the ordinary man's name for John across Dutch, Polish and Czech, and a woman's short form of Janet and Janice in English.
Unisex Dutch 52 in 2025
Roberta Roberta is a girl's name meaning bright fame, the feminine of Robert.
Girl Germanic 61 in 2025
Frédéric Frédéric is a boy's name from Germanic elements meaning peaceful ruler, the French form of Frederick.
Boy French 42 in 2025
Antoinette Antoinette means little Antoine, and the meaning usually given for the parent name — flower — is a false etymology.
Girl French 55 in 2025
Hilda Hilda means battle, and it is the surviving fragment of longer Germanic names — Hildegard, Brunhild and Matilda all contain it, and the element outlived most of the compounds it belonged to.
Girl Germanic 55 in 2025
Cyril Cyril means lord, and the man who carried it invented an alphabet — Cyrillic is named for the ninth-century missionary, though the script we call by his name was largely devised by his followers rather than by him.
Boy Greek 38 in 2025
Olga Olga is a Norse name in Russian dress — Helga traveled east with the Varangians and became Olga, so the patron saint of Kyiv and Moscow carries a Scandinavian word meaning holy.
Girl Russian 50 in 2025
Ted Ted is a boy's name that serves two unrelated names at once, and it exists because medieval English moved the n from "mine Edward."
Boy English 37 in 2025
Noémie Noémie is a girl's name of Hebrew origin meaning "pleasantness," borne by a woman in the Book of Ruth who asks to be called the opposite.
Girl French 47 in 2025
Hubert Hubert means bright mind, and its saint is the patron of hunters — Saint Hubertus, whose stag with a crucifix between its antlers is the emblem on every bottle of Jägermeister.
Boy Germanic 34 in 2025
Gaston Gaston is a boy's name most likely meaning "from Gascony," and a Disney villain has made it difficult in English while France is reviving it.
Boy French 34 in 2025
Aline Aline means noble, worn down from Adelaide through Adeline — three names that are the same word at three stages of erosion, and France ranks it 292nd on 185 births.
Girl French 44 in 2025
Luc Luc means from Lucania, an Italian region — so the name is a place rather than the light it is usually said to mean, and the light reading comes from confusion with a separate Latin word.
Boy French 33 in 2025
Hélène Hélène is a girl's name, the French form of Helen, whose Greek meaning was never established.
Girl French 42 in 2025
Pascal Pascal is a boy's name meaning of Easter, given to children born at Passover or Easter — and the word behind it is Hebrew, not Latin.
Boy French 31 in 2025
Geoffrey Geoffrey means peace, and only half of it is settled — the second element is agreed, while the first is disputed between three unrelated Germanic words, so the name is half-translatable.
Boy French 31 in 2025
Timothée Timothée is a boy's name of Greek origin meaning "honoring God," the French form of Timothy.
Boy French 29 in 2025
Wilfred Wilfred is a boy's name of Old English origin meaning "desiring peace."
Boy English 29 in 2025
Rupert Rupert is a boy's name of Germanic origin meaning "bright fame."
Boy Germanic 29 in 2025
Auguste Auguste is a boy's name of Latin origin meaning "great" or "venerable," the French form of Augustus.
Boy French 28 in 2025
Armand Armand is a boy's name of Germanic origin meaning "army man," the French form of Herman, borne by the cardinal who built the centralized French state.
Boy French 28 in 2025
Etienne Etienne means crown, and the Greek behind it is the wreath given to victors — so a name now read as saintly began as a prize handed to the winner of a race.
Boy French 27 in 2025
Rudolph Rudolph means famous wolf, and the reindeer was invented to sell things — a Montgomery Ward copywriter wrote him for a giveaway booklet in 1939, which makes him a corporate creation rather than a folk one.
Boy German 25 in 2025
Jeanne Jeanne is a girl's name of Hebrew origin meaning "God is gracious," the French feminine of Jean.
Girl French 30 in 2025
Bertha Bertha is a girl's name from a Germanic word meaning bright, and it was Charlemagne's mother's name.
Girl Germanic 30 in 2025
Michel Michel is a boy's name, the French form of Michael, from a Hebrew question meaning who is like God.
Boy French 31 in 2025
Myriam Myriam is the French spelling of Miriam, and France ranks it 287th while ranking Miriam itself 816th — so in its own market the respelling substantially outsells the original biblical form.
Girl French 27 in 2025
Katharine Katharine is the spelling closest to the Greek, and that Greek has never been explained — the pure gloss comes from a later association with katharos, clean, applied long after the name existed.
Girl Greek 27 in 2025

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A style is our reading of a name. A decade is the register — the names children were actually given, in order, with the counts.

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