The Most Popular Baby girl Names
The top five most popular baby girl names, exploring the meanings,
origin, and history behind these names.
It is now 20 weeks into your pregnancy, you’re lying on the table, and
the technician is lubricating the ultrasound instrument. As the sensor
is being moved around on your belly, your thoughts are centered around
one question, is it a boy or a girl? And then, the technician stops to
capture the frame on the monitor. She turns to you and says,
“Congratulations! It’s a girl!” Immediately you feel your heart rise,
the tears start to well up, and a huge grin comes across your face. Now,
you can finish the nursery, buy all the clothes and amenities, and the
most important thing, you can now choose a name. Most new parents love
this aspect of pregnancy and parenting. When you find out the sex of
your baby, it takes half of the guesswork out of shopping and choosing
colors for the nursery. Now couples and single parents can buy books,
poems, and quotes about their baby girls, either in literary works or
cute posters and pictures to put on the walls in the nursery. They can
pick out the pretty dresses for holidays and birthday parties, matching
bloomers, and adorable headbands that match.
Most of all, it eliminates guess work out of choosing a name. As a
parent, you want your name to be perfect for your baby girl. You want a
name that both you and your partner like, and possibly, one that will
instill part of your daughter’s personality. In this article, we will
discuss the most popular baby girl’s names, their meanings, and their
history. The first name on the list of baby girl’s names is Emma. It
is a German name in origin. Emma means all containing; universal. It is
suggested this name might be a derivation of Erma, which means “strong”,
but more literally translated as “universal” or “whole”. It is also
considered by some to be a diminutive of Emmanuelle. In history, this
name has appeared in several literary works, including Jane Austen’s
Emma, and French novelist Flaubert’s Madame Bovary. Madam Emma Bovary
was the famous protagonist in Flaubert’s work, and Emma Woodhouse was
the main character in Emma.
The second most popular baby girl name is Isabella. It means “My god is
a vow”, and is Hebraic in origin. There have been many influential
Isabella’s throughout history. There is Isabella of Castile, Isabella of
France, and Princess Isabella of Denmark, to name a few. In the literary
world, Isabella was the names of several characters in Shakespeare’s
works, and also in Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey, and Emily Bronte’s
Wuthering Heights. The third most popular name on the baby girl list
is Emily. It is Latin in origin, and means “Rival; emulating”. It is
from the Latin derivative of Aemilius, an historic Roman family. It
could also come from the Greek Aimulos, meaning “friendly, or tender”.
Notable historical Emily’s include Emily Dickenson, Emily Bronte, and
Emily Davison, a British women’s suffrage supporter. She is mainly known
for throwing herself in front of the king’s horse during the 1913 Derby.
The fourth baby girl name on the most popular list is Madison. Its
meaning is “the son of Maud, or Matthew’s son”. It is English in origin,
and it is a transferred use of the surname meaning “Maud’s son”. The
nickname for Matthew in the Middle Ages was Mad. Since the meaning of
Madison is masculine, it is not technically a unisex name. Madison was
first introduced as a girl’s name in Splash, starring Tom Hanks and
Daryl Hannah. Since then, its popularity among baby girls has grown
significantly.
The fifth most popular name for baby girls is Ava. It is Afghani in
origin, meaning “voice”. It is suspected it is a respelling of Eva.
Historically, St. Ava was a nun in the 9th century. Ava Gardner was an
American actress from the 1940s.
These are the top five most popular baby girl names today. Some
parents will name their daughters based on the meanings of the names,
and some will name them based on their opinion of the name itself,
without taking into account what it means. Some parents are the balance
of both of these options. However parents decide to name their
daughters, these are the most popular names in the world at the moment,
and they are this popular for a reason. |
