How popular is the baby name Alastair in the United States right now? How popular was it historically? Use the popularity graph and data table below to find out! Plus, see all the blog posts that mention the name Alastair.

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Popularity of the baby name Alastair


Posts that mention the name Alastair

Baby born in taxi, named for driver

taxis

In November of 2004, 21-year-old Rebecca Wilson of Dundee, Scotland, went into labor.

So she called called a taxi to take her to Ninewells hospital for the delivery.

The baby didn’t want to wait that long, however, and he ended up being born in the back of Alastair Maclean’s taxi cab.

[T]he young mum was so touched by the cabbie’s kindness, she has named her son after him.

She said: ‘The driver was brilliant and very calm. We’ve named the baby Alastair.’

Source: “Mum Names Taxi Birth Boy After Cabbie.” Daily Record [Glasgow] 5 Nov. 2004.

Image: Adapted from Cinema Shooting by Alex Proimos under CC BY 2.0.

Reduplicated names: Asher Asher, Owen Owen

oystercatcher birds

I find it interesting that some people are given forenames that exactly match their surnames. A few historically significant examples include:

(Ford Madox Ford and Horst P. Horst don’t count. They were born Ford Hermann Hueffer and Horst Paul Albert Bohrmann.)

There are also many forename/surname sets out there that are partially reduplicated, such as:

Have you ever met someone whose first name and last name were identical (or nearly so)? Do you like these sorts of names?

P.S. The name Thomas McKean Thompson McKennan (which belonged to a guy who served as U.S. Secretary of the Interior for a few weeks in 1850) is as close to a double double as I’ve ever seen!

Image: Adapted from Two Variable Oystercatchers standing close to each other (public domain)

[Last update: October 2023]

Baby name needed: Boy name for Gabriel’s brother

A reader named Julia is trying to come up with a name for her second son:

My first is a boy named Gabriel. We chose that name because we wanted a “less common” name, but one that was still considered “normal.” Now we are having a really difficult time figuring out another boy name with these same qualities. A few friends suggested Nathan, but that’s out because of a close cousin with the same name. Your ideas would be greatly appreciated!

I think Nathan was a great suggestion — too bad it’s out of the running. Here are some more names that might work:

Alastair
Benjamin
Caleb
Dominic
Douglas
Edgar
Edward
Elijah
Everett
Gregory
Henry		Isaac
Josiah
Julian
Julius
Kenneth
Leo
Levi
Lucas
Malcolm
Maximilian
Noah		Oliver
Raymond
Richard
Roman
Sebastian
Simon
Theo / Theodore
Timothy
Victor
Vincent
Xavier

Can you think of other boy names that sound good next to Gabriel?