Eighties Names

Names that peaked in the 1980s, when the American charts turned over faster than at any point before. A large share are respellings and inventions rather than revivals, which is what makes the decade recognizable at a glance.

Rankings for

67 names, most popular first in the United States

Very Rare Rare Uncommon

Girls Boys Unisex

Emmanuelle Emmanuelle means God is with us, and the Hebrew is a whole sentence rather than a word — Isaiah gives it as a sign, and Matthew quotes it, so the name is a quotation twice over.
Girl French #4,876 in US
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 #4,978 in US
Mathieu Mathieu is the French form of Matthew, meaning gift of God.
Boy French #5,031 in US
Candice Candice is not a name but a title — Kandake was the word for the queen mother of Kush, and Acts records one without naming her, so a royal office became a personal name by misreading.
Girl English #5,134 in US
Ebony Ebony reached English from ancient Egyptian, which makes it one of the oldest borrowings in the language — hbny passed into Greek and Latin with the timber itself, and English kept both the wood and the word.
Girl English #5,427 in US
Felicia Felicia means lucky, and the Latin felix meant fertile before it meant fortunate — the word originally described soil and livestock that produced well, and good fortune was a later extension of it.
Girl Latin #5,688 in US
Fanny Fanny means Frenchwoman, shortened from Frances — and it fell out of English-speaking use for reasons of slang while remaining an ordinary name in France, which is why France still ranks it 1,059th.
Girl French #6,442 in US
Benoît Benoît means blessed, and it is the French form of Benedict — the circumflex marks a lost s, so the older spelling was Benoist and the Latin behind it was benedictus, well-spoken-of.
Boy French #6,783 in US
Fabien Fabien means bean grower, from a Roman family name — the Fabii were among Rome's oldest houses, and several great clans took their names from crops rather than from virtues or conquests.
Boy French #7,010 in US
Mickael Mickael is a French respelling of Michael, meaning who is like God — a rhetorical question whose expected answer is nobody.
Boy French #7,207 in US
Matthieu Matthieu means gift of God, and it is the second spelling of this name in this group — France ranks Matthieu 430th and Mathieu 416th, so the two have split the sound almost exactly evenly.
Boy French #7,442 in US
Aurélien Aurélien means golden, from a Roman family name, and the emperor who carried it built the walls that still ring Rome — Aurelian's wall went up in the 270s and much of it is standing.
Boy French #8,137 in US
Latoya Latoya is an American invention with no source language, and its 1984 peak of 5,069 births is the largest single-year figure in this group — the victory gloss offered for it is attached to a coinage.
Girl American #11,650 in US
Romain Romain is a French boy's name meaning a Roman, from the Latin word for a citizen of Rome.
Boy French 194,729 births
Laetitia Laetitia means joy, and it is the Latin original standing behind the far more common Letitia and Lettice.
Girl French 144,722 births
Amandine Amandine means worthy of love, and the grammar is unusual — the Latin is a gerundive, a form expressing obligation, so the name means one who must be loved rather than one who happens to be.
Girl French 96,616 births
Laure Laure means laurel, and the wreath was a prize rather than an ornament — Roman victors and poets wore it, which is where laureate and baccalaureate both come from.
Girl French 85,898 births
Florent Florent means flowering, and it ranks in France alone at 1,358th — one of the most tightly national names in this band, with no measured presence in the five other markets.
Boy French 70,948 births
Ludivine Ludivine may have been invented for television — the name has almost no record before a French series used it in the 1970s, and its rise begins immediately afterward.
Girl French 42,149 births

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