How popular is the baby name Bertille 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 Bertille.

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Popularity of the baby name Bertille


Posts that mention the name Bertille

Popular baby names in Paris, 2022

Flag of France
Flag of France

Paris, the capital of France, has an area of 41 square miles and a population of about 2.1 million — making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world.

Last year, Paris’ most popular baby names were Alma and Gabriel.

Here are the city’s top 50+ girl names and top 50 boy names of 2022:

Girl Names

  1. Alma, 211 baby girls
  2. Louise, 210
  3. Emma, 152
  4. Jeanne, 150
  5. Anna, 144
  6. Adèle, 138
  7. Rose, 136
  8. Gabrielle, 133
  9. Chloé, 131
  10. Jade, 128 (tie)
  11. Léa, 128 (tie)
  12. Victoria, 126
  13. Alice, 120 (tie)
  14. Lina, 120 (tie)
  15. Sofia, 117
  16. Iris, 115 (tie)
  17. Olivia, 115 (tie)
  18. Juliette, 114 (tie)
  19. Victoire, 114 (tie)
  20. Romy, 113
  21. Eva, 111
  22. Joséphine, 106
  23. Ava, 104
  24. Fatoumata, 103
  25. Alba, 98
  26. Diane, 96
  27. Ambre, 94 (3-way tie)
  28. Nina, 94 (3-way tie)
  29. Zoé, 94 (3-way tie)
  30. Charlotte, 92
  31. Mia, 90
  32. Alix, 89 (tie)
  33. Julia, 89 (tie)
  34. Léonie, 88
  35. Sarah, 87
  36. Ella, 86
  37. Lou, 83
  38. Suzanne, 82
  39. Charlie, 81
  40. Nour, 78
  41. Héloïse, 75
  42. Mariam, 74
  43. Romane, 72
  44. Inaya, 68
  45. Agathe, 64
  46. Inès, 63 (tie)
  47. Maya, 63 (tie)
  48. Madeleine, 62
  49. Céleste, 59
  50. Aminata, 57 (tie)
  51. Fatima, 57 (tie)

Boy Names

  1. Gabriel, 332 baby boys
  2. Adam, 254
  3. Raphaël, 250
  4. Louis, 223
  5. Mohamed, 209
  6. Arthur, 199
  7. Isaac, 190
  8. Noah, 180
  9. Gaspard, 175
  10. Léon, 173
  11. Léo, 158
  12. Joseph, 154
  13. Paul, 150
  14. Lucas, 145
  15. Victor, 139
  16. Hugo, 119
  17. Alexandre, 118
  18. Jules, 116
  19. Sacha, 115
  20. Ibrahim, 109
  21. Noé, 103
  22. Augustin, 101
  23. Liam, 95
  24. Oscar, 94
  25. Samuel, 92
  26. Maël, 91
  27. Marceau, 89 (3-way tie)
  28. Simon, 89 (3-way tie)
  29. Timothée, 89 (3-way tie)
  30. Nathan, 88
  31. Basile, 81
  32. Côme, 80
  33. Aaron, 79
  34. Ethan, 78
  35. Auguste, 77 (4-way tie)
  36. Eliott, 77 (4-way tie)
  37. Moussa, 77 (4-way tie)
  38. Naël, 77 (4-way tie)
  39. Marius, 75
  40. Eden, 74
  41. Mathis, 72 (tie)
  42. Rayan, 72 (tie)
  43. Achille, 71 (3-way tie)
  44. Andrea, 71 (3-way tie)
  45. Valentin, 71 (3-way tie)
  46. Antoine, 70
  47. Charles, 69
  48. Ismaël, 68
  49. Léonard, 66 (tie)
  50. Martin, 66 (tie)

And here’s a selection of names from lower down in the rankings, which includes all names given to at least five Parisian babies (of one gender or the other) per year.

Girl namesBoy names
Aliénor (40 baby girls), Mahaut (26), Louison (17), Mahault (15), Cassandre (10), Kimia (9), Solène (8), Bertille (7), Astrée (6), Bamby (5)Gaston (34 baby boys), Mathéo (27), Ruben (23), Ambroise (21), Célestin (16), Camil (13), Louison (7), Thaddée (7), Barthélémy (5), Ennio (5)

The female names Mahaut and Mahault are Middle French forms of Mathilde, and the gender-neutral name Louison is a diminutive of both Louise and Louis.

Finally, here’s a link to Paris’ 2021 rankings, if you’d like to compare last year to the year before.

Sources: Prénoms déclarés – Paris Data, Paris – Wikipedia, Behind the Name, Mathilda – dmnes.org

Image: Adapted from Flag of France (public domain)

Where did the baby name Bertil come from in 1912?

Princess Margaret and baby Bertil (in 1913)
Princess Margaret and Bertil

Crown Prince Gustaf VI of Sweden and his wife, Margaret, welcomed their fourth child, a baby boy, in February of 1912. They named him Bertil.

The same year Prince Bertil was born, the name Bertil appeared for the first time in the U.S. baby name data:

  • 1914: 31 baby boys named Bertil
  • 1913: 17 baby boys named Bertil
  • 1912: 16 baby boys named Bertil [debut]
  • 1911: unlisted
  • 1910: unlisted

Bertil was the second-highest debut that year, after Woodroe (inspired by Woodrow Wilson, who was elected president in November).

But the early SSA numbers tend to skew low, so here’s some data from the Social Security Death Index (SSDI) for a different perspective. (I’m only counting people with the first name Bertil, and I’m ignoring the feminine variants Bertille and Bertilla.)

  • 1914: 51 people named Bertil
  • 1913: 37 people named Bertil
  • 1912: 40 people named Bertil
  • 1911: 19 people named Bertil
  • 1910: 32 people named Bertil

Just about all of the surnames I saw for Bertils in the SSDI were Swedish. Even more interesting, the SSA data indicates that many of these Bertils were born in Minnesota, Illinois and Massachusetts — states with large Swedish communities:

By 1910 the position of the Midwest as a place of residence for the Swedish immigrants and their children was still strong, but had weakened. Fifty-four percent of the Swedish immigrants and their children now lived in these states, with Minnesota and Illinois dominating. Fifteen percent lived in the East, where the immigrants were drawn to industrial areas in New England. New York City and Worcester, Massachusetts, were two leading destinations.

I think it’s safe to conclude that this usage of Bertil was occurring among Swedish immigrants (and their descendants) exclusively.

So what’s the etymology of Bertil? According to the Handbook of Scandinavian Names, the names Bertil and Bertel (which debuted the very next year) are “forms of the first element in German names like Berthold, from bert ‘bright, shining.’ The site Behind the Name simply says Bertil is a form of Berthold, meaning “bright ruler.”

Surprisingly, Bertil isn’t the first U.S. baby name debut we can link to Swedish royalty. Ebba, which debuted in 1888, was inspired by Princess Ebba Bernadotte — baby Bertil’s great aunt.

P.S. Bertil’s siblings were named Gustaf, Sigvard, Ingrid, and Carl. Curiously, none of them had a discernible influence on the U.S. baby name data like their brother did.

Sources:

Image: Prins Bertil och hans mor