How popular is the baby name Cleopatra 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 Cleopatra.

The graph will take a few moments to load. (Don't worry, it shouldn't take 9 months!) If it's taking too long, try reloading the page.


Popularity of the baby name Cleopatra


Posts that mention the name Cleopatra

Baby names inspired by the solar eclipse: Helios, Mahina, Blake

Total solar eclipse (August 2017)
Total solar eclipse

On August 21, the United States will see its first coast-to-coast solar eclipse since 1918. If you’re planning to have (or conceive!) a baby around the time of the eclipse, you might be interested in a name that marks the event (but that perhaps isn’t as obvious as Eclipse itself).

So what are your options?

Names with “celestial” associations

A solar eclipse involves the alignment of three celestial bodies — the sun (a star), the moon, and the Earth — in the sky. You could use a name that is associated in some way with one of these elements, such as…

“Sun” names

  • Haru (Japanese)
  • Helios (ancient Greek)
  • Hina (Japanese)
  • Inti (Quechua)
  • Nou (Hmong)
  • Ra (ancient Egyptian)
  • Ravi (Sanskrit)
  • Shams (Arabic)
  • Sol (Spanish & Portuguese, ultimately from Latin)
  • Solaris (Latin)
  • Soleil (French)
  • Sunniva (Old English)
  • Sunny (English)
  • Surya (Sanskrit)

“Star” names

  • Aster (ancient Greek)
  • Astra (based on the ancient Greek word)
  • Citlalli (Nahuatl)
  • Estelle (French)
  • Estrella (Spanish)
  • Hoshi (Japanese)
  • Najm & Najma (Arabic)
  • Seren (Welsh)
  • Star (English)
  • Starla (based on the English word)
  • Stjarna (Icelandic)
  • Stella (Latin)
  • Tähti (Finnish)
  • Tara (Sanskrit)

“Moon” names

  • Aylin (Turkish)
  • Badr (Arabic)
  • Chandra (Sanskrit)
  • Dal (Korean)
  • Dawa (Tibetan)
  • Ilargi (Basque)
  • Luna (Latin)
  • Lusine (Armenian)
  • Mahina (Hawaiian & Tongan)
  • Máni (Icelandic)
  • Metztli (Nahuatl)
  • Moon (English)
  • Qamar (Arabic)
  • Selene (ancient Greek)

“Earth” names

  • Avani (Sanskrit)
  • Bhumi (Sanskrit)
  • Eartha (based on the English word)
  • Gaia (ancient Greek)
  • Ki (Sumerian)
  • Tierra (Spanish)
  • Tlalli (Nahuatl)

“Sky” names

  • Akash (Sanskrit)
  • Alya (Arabic)
  • Anu (Sumerian)
  • Caelus (Latin)
  • Céleste (French)
  • Ciel (French)
  • Cielo (Spanish)
  • Lani (Hawaiian)
  • Ortzi (Basque)
  • Sky (English)
  • Skyla (based on the English word)
  • Sora (Japanese)

You could even look for a name that contains more than one of these elements. I’ve come across a handful of names that happen to contain both an element meaning “sun” and an element meaning “moon,” for instance. Examples include Ravichandra (Sanskrit), Künnei (Yakut), Aygün (Turkish), and Günay (also Turkish).

Names with “dark” associations

The main event, from an Earthling’s perspective, is the darkening of the sun thanks to the moon getting in the way and casting its shadow over us. So you could use a name associated in some way with darkness, such as…

“Shadow” names

  • Chhaya (Sanskrit)
  • Shade (English)
  • Shadow (English)
  • Umbra (Latin)
  • Zalaph (Hebrew)
  • Zillah (Hebrew)

“Dark” or “Black” names

  • Adham (Arabic)
  • Blake (English surname)
  • Charna (Yiddish)
  • Ciar & Ciara (Irish)
  • Ciarán (Irish)
  • Dubhán (Irish)
  • Duff (Irish surname)
  • Jett (English)
  • Kara (Turkish)
  • Krishna (Sanskrit)
  • Melaina (ancient Greek)
    • Melania (Latin, based on melaina)
    • Mélanie (French form of Melania)
  • Raven (English)
  • Sullivan (Irish surname)

“Night” names

  • Layla (Arabic)
  • Nisha (Sanskrit)
  • Njóla (Icelandic)
  • Noctis (Latin)
  • Nox (Latin)
  • Nyx (ancient Greek)
  • Rajani (Sanskrit)
  • Rajnish (Sanskrit)
  • Tuta (Quechua)
  • Yoalli (Nahuatl)

I think Blake and Sullivan are particularly intriguing choices.

The English surname Blake can come from either of two similar Middle English words that happen to have opposite definitions: blac, meaning “black,” or blac, meaning “wan, pale, white, fair.” So it manages to encapsulate the concepts of both darkness and lightness — two key elements of an eclipse.

And the Irish surname Sullivan, “descendant of Súileabhán,” is based on the Gaelic personal name Súileabhán, meaning “little dark eye” — which sounds a lot like a poetic description of an eclipse.

Name pairings with both “celestial” and “dark” associations

You could combine some of the “celestial” and “dark” names above to get something more specific, like…

  • Layla Soleil: “night” and “sun”
  • Jett Helios: “black” and “sun”
  • Ciarán Sol: “black” and “sun”
  • Mélanie Stella: “dark” and “star” (“Dark Star” is also a Grateful Dead song)
  • Luna Zillah: “moon” and “shadow” (“Moon Shadow” is also a Cat Stevens song)

Names (or name pairings) featuring the letters “S” and “E”

This is as inconspicuous as it gets. Commemorate the solar eclipse simply by using the letters “S” and “E” in combination. You could choose a single name that starts with “Se-,” like…

Sela
Selene (“moon” in Greek)
Selma
Seraphina
Seren (“star” in Welsh)
Serenity
Sean
Sebastian
Sefton
Sergio
Seth
Severino

Or, you could use a pair of names that start with “S-” and “E-,” such as…

Sabrina Eden
Sydney Elise
Sarah Evangeline
Susanna Elizabeth
Simon Elijah
Spencer Ellis
Shane Everett
Samuel Edward

Which of the above names (or combos) do you like most? What other solar eclipse-themed ideas would you add to this list?

P.S. Did you know that Cleopatra gave her twins the middle names Selene and Helios?

Update, 5/15/2018: The baby name Eclipse debuted in the 2017 SSA data! The baby name Moon also more than tripled in usage last year.

Update, 12/31/2022: The rare Icelandic name Myrkvi can mean “eclipse” (also “darkness”).

Update, 2/28/2023: Actress Soleil Moon Frye‘s given names mean “sun” and (of course) “moon.”

Sources:

Image: Adapted from 2017 Total Solar Eclipse by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center under CC BY 2.0.

What gave the baby name Charmaine a boost (twice)?

The characters Sgt. Quirt, Charmaine, and Capt. Flagg from the silent film "What Price Glory?" (1926)
Sgt. Quirt, Charmaine, & Capt. Flagg from “What Price Glory?

The name Charmaine reminds me of the name Cheryl — both are relatively recent inventions with hazy origins, both saw increased usage thanks to popular culture, and both sound a bit dated these days.

Charmaine never became as popular as Cheryl did, but, interestingly, the two main pop culture boosts that it got — in 1928 and in 1952 — were caused by the very same thing.

The silent film What Price Glory? (1926) was a comedy/drama set in France during World War I. The film followed two U.S. Marines, Capt. Flagg and Sgt. Quirt, as they fought for the affections of Charmaine (played by Dolores del Rio), the local innkeeper’s daughter.

The movie’s theme song, “Charmaine,” was used as a leitmotif throughout the film. It went on to become a huge hit in the late 1920s. The best-selling recording, by Guy Lombardo and his orchestra, spent seven weeks at #1 on the U.S. Billboard charts in 1927.

In response to the popular song, hundreds of American baby girls were named Charmaine:

  • 1929: 113 baby girls named Charmaine (rank: 655th)
  • 1928: 265 baby girls named Charmaine (rank: 419th)
  • 1927: 74 baby girls named Charmaine (rank: 856th)
  • 1926: 8 baby girls named Charmaine
  • 1925: 10 baby girls named Charmaine

A generation later, in 1952, the film was remade — this time with sound and color. (In this version, Charmaine was played by Corinne Calvet.)

The song “Charmaine” again became a hit. Multiple versions landed on the U.S. Billboard charts, including an instrumental version by the Mantovani Orchestra that peaked at #10 in 1951 and a version by the Billy May Orchestra that reached #17 in 1952.

This time around, usage of the baby name Charmaine more than tripled:

  • 1954: 351 baby girls named Charmaine (rank: 475th)
  • 1953: 430 baby girls named Charmaine (rank: 416th)
  • 1952: 619 baby girls named Charmaine (rank: 331st) [peak usage]
  • 1951: 192 baby girls named Charmaine (rank: 623rd)
  • 1950: 152 baby girls named Charmaine (rank: 698th)

Usage has been decreasing ever since, though. In 2014, just 18 baby girls were named Charmaine.

So where does the name Charmaine come from?

Sources suggest that it’s based on either the English word “charm” or the name Charmian. Charmian is a variant of Charmion, based on the ancient Greek word kharma, meaning “delight.” (One of Cleopatra’s servants was named Charmion.) The second syllable may have been influenced by the name Lorraine, which was fashionable in the early 1900s.

Which name do you like more, Charmaine or Cheryl?

Sources:

  • Charmaine (song) – Wikipedia
  • Melnick, Ross. American Showman: Samuel “Roxy” Rothafel and the Birth of the Entertainment Industry. New York: Columbia University Press, 2012.

What popularized the baby name Theda in the 1910s?

Actress Theda Bara in "Salome" (1918).
Theda Bara in “Salome

The name Theda became trendy in during the second half of the 1910s, according to the U.S. baby name data:

  • 1921: 293 baby girls named Theda [rank: 395th]
  • 1920: 290 baby girls named Theda [rank: 385th]
  • 1919: 356 baby girls named Theda [rank: 337th] (peak usage)
  • 1918: 354 baby girls named Theda [rank: 351st]
  • 1917: 334 baby girls named Theda [rank: 343rd]
  • 1916: 315 baby girls named Theda [rank: 350th]
  • 1915: 124 baby girls named Theda [rank: 585th]
  • 1914: 33 baby girls named Theda
  • 1913: 17 baby girls named Theda

Here’s a visual:

Graph of the usage of the baby name Theda in the U.S. since 1880
Usage of the baby name Theda

What accounts for this trendiness?

Silent film star Theda Bara (pronounced thee-da bare-a), one of Hollywood’s first sex symbols.

She was born in Ohio in 1885 with the full name Theodosia Burr Goodman. Her parents named her after Theodosia Burr (1783-1813), the ill-fated daughter of third U.S. Vice President Aaron Burr. (Theodosia Burr was lost at sea at the age of 29.)

Theda Bara was the first film star to rise overnight from anonymity into superstardom. In the fall of 1914, she was an unknown actress. Four months later she was the world’s most famous star.

The movie that launched her career, A Fool There Was, was released in January of 1915 “with an intense publicity campaign.” It featured Bara as a vampire seductress, or vamp.

Bara ended up becoming Fox studio’s biggest star during the second half of the 1910s. During this period she made dozens of films, including Cleopatra (1917), one of her biggest hits. Her characters were often femme fatales.

She married in 1921, and, several years later, retired from acting altogether.

Nowadays, few baby girls are named Theda. Do you think the name could make a comeback someday?

Sources:

Popular baby names in England and Wales (UK), 2008

Flag of the United Kingdom
Flag of the United Kingdom

Ready for some rankings?

Here are England and Wales’ top 20 girl names and top 20 boy names of 2008:

Girl Names

  1. Olivia, 5,325 baby girls
  2. Ruby, 4,931
  3. Emily, 4,881
  4. Grace, 4,775
  5. Jessica, 4,672
  6. Chloe, 4,605
  7. Sophie, 4,380
  8. Lily, 4,047
  9. Amelia, 3,440
  10. Evie, 3,281
  11. Mia, 3,121
  12. Ella, 3,042
  13. Charlotte, 2,939
  14. Lucy, 2,876
  15. Megan, 2,515
  16. Ellie, 2,505
  17. Isabelle, 2,460
  18. Isabella, 2,424
  19. Hannah, 2,335
  20. Katie, 2,324

Boy Names

  1. Jack, 8,010 baby boys
  2. Oliver, 7,417
  3. Thomas, 6,062
  4. Harry, 6,008
  5. Joshua, 5,716
  6. Alfie, 5,566
  7. Charlie, 5,291
  8. Daniel, 5,191
  9. James, 5,170
  10. William, 5,169
  11. Samuel, 4,624
  12. George, 4,214
  13. Joseph, 3,764
  14. Lewis, 3,482
  15. Ethan, 3,451
  16. Mohammed, 3,442
  17. Dylan, 3,373
  18. Benjamin, 3,275
  19. Alexander, 3,215
  20. Jacob, 3,127

Intriguingly, the name Honey ranked 190th on the girls’ list. A whopping 279 baby girls got the name. In contrast, just 90 U.S. baby girls were named Honey that year, and the name has never once cracked the U.S. top 1,000. I wonder what accounts for the relative popularity of Honey overseas.

Finally, here are some of the names that were used less often in 2008…

Uncommon Girl NamesUncommon Boy Names
Bluebell (20 baby girls), Primrose (17), Temperance (13), Breeze (11), Cleopatra (11), Sorrel (11), Tigerlily (9), Tirion (9), Comfort (8), Peaches (8), Pebbles (8), Beyonce (7), Miami (7), Zinnia (7), Godiva (6), Mercades (5), Panashe (5), Tulip (5), Wednesday (5), Magenta (4), Boadicea (3), Cayenne (3), Kimora-Lee (3), Plum (3), Rejoice (3)Spike (23 baby boys), Willoughby (22), Ziggy (20), Ptolemy (19), Zidane (13), Zinedine (12), Kal-El (10), Hendrix (9), Humphrey (8), Elan (6), Gruff (6), Legend (6), Achilles (5), Amen (5), Bright (5), Jesse-James (5), Tennyson (5), Darlington (4), James-Dean (4), Courage (3), Freedom (3), Messiah (3), Remus (3), Riquelme (3), Seven (3)

What are your thoughts on these rankings/names?

Sources: Office for National Statistics, England & Wales Baby Names

Image: Adapted from Flag of the United Kingdom (public domain)