How popular is the baby name Isolde 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 Isolde.

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Popularity of the baby name Isolde


Posts that mention the name Isolde

Popular baby names in Ukraine, 2022

Flag of Ukraine
Flag of Ukraine

The Eastern European country of Ukraine is the second-largest country on the continent, after Russia.

Several years ago, Ukraine had a population of roughly 42 million, making it Europe’s eighth most populous country. Following Russia’s full-scale invasion in February of 2022, however, more than 8 million Ukrainians have fled to other countries (such as Poland).

Ukraine’s Ministry of Justice recently revealed the top baby names of 2022 in the capital city of Kyiv and in five nearby regions (called “oblasts”). All six of these places are located in the central/western part of the country:

Map of Ukraine
Map of Ukraine

Rankings weren’t included, so, in the tables below, I’ve written the names in the order in which they appeared in the news release.

Kyiv (city)

Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, has a population of over 2.9 million — making it the seventh most populous city in Europe. Here are Kyiv’s top baby names of 2022:

Girl NamesBoy Names
City of KyivSofiya
Polina
Viktoriya
Eva
Anna
Mariya
Mark
Oleksandr
Maksym
Matviy
Artem

The city’s rare names included…

  • Girls: Afeliya, Javelina, Vlastylyna, Ava, Elya, Danya, Mriya, Agpiya, Sonya, Lali, Lukeriya, Zlatoslava, Zemfira
  • Boys: Orion, Hraf (Graf), Kiy, Kai, Slaven, Horus, Avenir, Eleazar, Danko, Yavir, Danislav, Azariy, Veleslav
St. Javelin

Javelina and its male equivalent, Javelin, are two of the weapon-inspired names that have emerged in the wake of the Russian invasion. They come from the FGM-148 Javelin — an American-made, hand-held, anti-tank missile system. The weapon is featured in the pro-Ukrainian “St. Javelin” internet meme (above). Incidentally, a baby born in Sonoma County in 2022 was named Javelin — perhaps his family is Ukrainian?

Another weapon-inspired name being given to baby boys is Bayraktar. This one comes from the Bayraktar TB2 — a Turkish-made unmanned aerial vehicle that carries laser-guided bombs. The word bayraktar means “flag-bearer” in Turkish.

Kyiv Oblast

Kyiv Oblast has a population of over 1.7 million. Here are the region’s top baby names of 2022:

Girl NamesBoy Names
Kyiv OblastAnna
Anastasiya
Veronika
Viktoriya
Eva
Mariya
Polina
Solomiya
Sofiya
Andriy
Artem
Bohdan
Vladyslav
Danylo
David
Dmytro
Matviy
Mark
Maksym
Nazar
Oleksandr
Timofey
Yaroslav

Solomiya is the Ukrainian form of Salome.

The region’s rare names included…

  • Girls: Aurika, Bozhena, Dayana, Evangelina, Emily, Narin, Noel, Rachel, Yasmina
  • Boys: Arney, Vil’yam, Demyan, Lavr, Leon, Matt, Seraphim, Tamirlan, Teymur

Vinnytsia Oblast

Vinnytsia Oblast has a population of over 1.5 million. Here are the region’s top baby names of 2022:

Girl NamesBoy Names
Vinnytsia OblastSofiya
Anna
Anastasiya
Viktoriya
Solomiya
Artem
Dmytro
Maksym
Matviy
Mark

The region’s rare names included…

  • Girls: Pollyanna, Afina (Athena), Kyriena, Solomiya-Sevda, Lolita, Monika
  • Boys: Sultan, Elisey, Radoslav, Moses, Nikitas

Khmelnytskyi Oblast

Khmelnytskyi Oblast has a population of over 1.27 million. Here are the region’s top baby names of 2022:

Girl NamesBoy Names
Khmelnytskyi OblastAnastasiya
Anna
Viktoriya
Veronika
Daryna
Emiliya
Eva
Zlata
Mariya
Nadiya
Oleksandra
Polina
Solomiya
Sofiya
Yaryna
Andriy
Artem
Vladyslav
David
Danylo
Ilya
Maksym
Mark
Matviy
Mykhailo
Nazar
Oleksandr
Roman
Timofey
Yaroslav

Yaryna is related to Irina (Irene).

The region’s rare names included…

  • Girls: Alvina, Amaliya, Afina (Athena), Vanessa, Vivien, Hloriya (Gloria), Zara, Liliana, Luna, Patrina, Yunna, Ulpana
  • Boys: Dominik, Iskander, Marius, Nathaniel, Nikodim, Ryan, Seviur, Stefa, Yusuf

Zhytomyr Oblast

Zhytomyr Oblast has a population of over 1.21 million. Here are the region’s top baby names of 2022:

Girl NamesBoy Names
Zhytomyr OblastAlina, Alisa, Alisiya, Anhelina, Anna, Anastasiya, Arina, Bohdana, Valentyna, Valeriya, Varvara, Veronika, Viktoriya, Darina, Evelina, Emiliya, Eva, Elizaveta, Zlata, Karina, Kateryna, Kipa, Marharyta (Margarita), Mariya, Marta, Milana, Myroslava, Nikole, Oleksandra, Polina, Sofiya, Solomiya, Yuliya, YanaAndriy, Artem, Artur, Bohdan, Volodymyr, Vladyslav, Danyil, Danylo, Denis, Dmytro, Yehor, Zakhar, Ivan, Ilya, Kyrylo, Lev, Makar, Maksym, Mark, Maryan, Matviy, Mykhailo, Nazar, Nikita, Oleksandr, Stefan, Timofey, Timur, Yuriy, Yan, Yaroslav

The region’s rare names included…

  • Girls: Aurora, Ahata (Agatha), Adelina, Adriana, Albina, Alvina, Aneliya, Anisiya, Bozhena, Habriella (Gabriella), Diana, Dariana, Dilara, Dominika, Elina, Elvira, Eliana, Emira, Emma, Esther, Ilona, Ilariya, Liana, Lika, Liya, Malika, Melisa, Mila, Milena, Mira, Miya, Monika, Nikoletta, Nikoloz, Oliviya, Radmira, Rosa, Roksolana, Ruf, Sabina, Sandra, Stella, Stefaniya, Teona, Ulyana
  • Boys: Avdei, Ayrton, Aleks, Amin, Amibrek, Amir, Arman, Armen, Arsen, Brian, Biloslav, Bartholomew, Veniamin, Damir, Danil, Josh, Ernest, Emmanuel, Imran, Yonatan, Lavrin, Larion, Leon, Luka, Maksymilian, Milan, Nestor, Oles, Oscar, Platon, Radion, Rinat, Reuben, Samuel, Sarmat, Seraphim, Svitozhar, Tamirlan, Farid, Khoma

Cherkasy Oblast

Cherkasy Oblast has a population of close to 1.2 million. Here are the region’s top baby names of 2022:

Girl NamesBoy Names
Cherkasy OblastAnastasiya
Anna
Alisa
Arina
Veronika
Viktoriya
Eva
Mariya
Milana
Solomiya
Sofiya
Stefaniya
Polina
Artem
Bohdan
Volodymyr
Vladyslav
Denis
Dmytro
Ivan
Maksym
Mark
Matviy
Nazar
Oleksandr
Timofey
Yaroslav

The region’s rare names included…

  • Girls: Aveliya, Aya, Hlafira (Glafira), Elmira, Emma, Zoryana, Isolde, Ilariya, Chiara, Karolina, Luna, Miropiya, Mriya, Solya, Tiana, Tsvitana, Yasmina, Yatomira
  • Boys: Ayman, Arey, Gulorom, Dar, Yesfir, Zakir, Zlatan, Ilon, Kosma, Lubomyr, Mars, Meruzh, Orest, Radomir, Sayan, Tehran, Tikhon

The name Stefaniya is on the rise thanks to the song “Stefania” by Ukrainian folk/rap group Kalush Orchestra. It won the 2022 Eurovision Song Contest by a landslide. The lyrics refer to the lead singer’s mother, but the song “has since taken on a new, more patriotic meaning.” Here’s the music video:

I suspect that Viktoriya (Victoria) — which means “victory” in Latin, and appears on all six of the lists above — bears extra significance among Ukrainians these days as well.

Sources:

Image: Adapted from Flag of Ukraine (public domain)
Map: Adapted from Ukraine (1991-2014) location map by NordNordWest under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Where did the baby name Kirsten come from in 1937?

Opera singer Kirsten Flagstad (1895-1962).
Kirsten Flagstad

The name Kirsten first appeared in the U.S. baby name data in 1937:

  • 1939: 16 baby girls named Kirsten
  • 1938: 14 baby girls named Kirsten
  • 1937: 10 baby girls named Kirsten
  • 1936: unlisted
  • 1935: unlisted

The reason?

Norwegian opera singer Kirsten (pronounced keer-sten) Flagstad, who became famous in America in the mid-1930s, particularly for playing Wagnerian roles (like Isolde in Tristan und Isolde, and Brünnhilde in Die Walküre). People would have been able to hear her on 1930s radio shows like Kraft Music Hall (NBC) with Bing Crosby and The Ford Sunday Evening Hour (CBS).

Her first name is the Norwegian form of Christina. (She also had an interesting middle name, Malfrid, which is made up of Old Norse elements meaning “ore” and “beautiful.”)

Do you like the name Kirsten?

Sources: Kirsten Flagstad – Wikipedia, Malfrid – Nordic Names Wiki

Name quotes #91: Wendy, Elliot, Thorlogh

Bruce Springsteen's album "Born to Run" (1975)
Springsteen album

From the 2010 book Runaway Dream: Born to Run and Bruce Springsteen’s American Vision by Louis P. Masur:

Peter Knobler, a writer for Crawdaddy, got an early listen [to “Born to Run”] in Springsteen’s Long Branch house. The place was cluttered with motorcycle magazines and old 45s. Over Bruce’s bed, according to Knobler, was a poster of Peter Pan leading Wendy out the window. The detail is suggestive: “Wendy let me in, I wanna be your friend/I want to guard your dreams and visions.”

From a Dictionary of Medieval Names from European Sources blog post entitled “The Tiffany Problem“:

Wait, what? No way there’s a Tiffany in this book! Not when there are other women running around with convincing names like Blanchefleur, Isolde, and Ermentrude.

[…]

[T]he Tiffany Problem describes the tension between historical fact and the average, everyday person’s idea of history. So even though authors may research carefully and want to include historically accurate information in their book—like a medieval character named Tiffany—a popular audience likely won’t buy it.

And from another DMNES post, about Protestant and Puritan names in Ireland vs. England:

Tait says one might expect the saint names, pushed by the Catholic church during the Reformation, and English names, handed down to descendants of settlers, to overtake and eradicate the use of Gaelic names as it did in England (315). She found this was not the case. Irish natives and settlers each retained their own naming systems, preserving them both. In the 1660s, she finds the top 6 names used by native Irish families remained largely Gaelic– Patrick, Bryan, Hugh, Owen, Thorlogh, and Shane, while the top names used by the descendants of settlers remained largely English– John, Thomas, William, Robert, James, and Richard (316).

From a New York Times article about the marriage of Sugar Good, a Dunkin’ Donuts manager, to one of her drive-through customers:

A year would go by before she gathered the courage to pass him her sprinkle-bedecked business card with his breakfast in September 2018. But when she did, it came as a relief to both. The man, John Thompson, a recently retired Marine working as a car salesman in Oklahoma City, had been wondering how he was going to figure out what her real name was.

“When I started going through the drive-through, I noticed she would smile with her eyes, and I thought, maybe if I read the receipt I can see what her name is,” he said. “But it said ‘Sugar No. 7.'” He figured Sugar must have been a reference to how he likes his coffee. With the card, which listed her cellphone number at the bottom, she cleared up the mystery — as well as her own case of the blues.

From the 2015 essay “The Name on My Coffee Cup” by Saïd Sayrafiezadeh:

As a frequent consumer of Starbucks…the most contentious aspect for me when ordering coffee—until now, anyway—has been the perpetual misspelling of my name on the side of the cup. The mutations have been many, and they have often been egregious—“Zal,” “Sowl,” “Sagi,” “Shi”—and then once, incredibly, three years ago, at a branch in the financial district, “Saïd,” diaeresis added, prompting me to seek out the barista, whose hand I grasped with deep feeling but who, frankly, seemed perplexed that anyone would have difficulty spelling my name. He was Latino, I think, and he told me that he had a best friend named Saïd, spelled identically, which would explain his astuteness. Never mind the backstory, I was delighted by the outcome. I photographed the cup for posterity, and then, for good measure, tweeted it for the world to see.

Other tweeted misspellings include Saíd, Syeed, Sai, Saii, Sahi, Sie, Säd, Sia, and Sam.

Where did the baby name Tristram come from in 1958?

Actor Tris Coffin (1909-1990).
Tristram “Tris” Coffin

The baby name Tristram, which has been around for centuries, didn’t debut in the U.S. baby name data until 1958:

  • 1960: unlisted
  • 1959: unlisted
  • 1958: 5 baby boys named Tristram
  • 1957: unlisted
  • 1956: unlisted

This was the year after the name Tris, which had charted as a girl name several times, first appeared on the boys’ list.

The influence behind both names was American actor Tristram “Tris” Coffin, who starred in the TV series 26 Men from late 1957 to mid-1959. In the show he played a fictionalized version of Thomas H. Rynning, captain of the Arizona Rangers during the early 1900s.

His first name is a variant of Tristan, immortalized in the tragic medieval tale of Tristan and Iseult (a.k.a Isolde). We don’t know for sure where the name Tristan comes from, as it’s been “altered from an irrecoverable original as a result of transmission through Old French sources that insisted on associating it with Latin tristis ‘sad,’ a reference to the young knight’s tragic fate.” Tristan may have been based on the Pictish male name Drustan/Drosten, a diminutive form of Drest/Drust/Drost, which was a common name among Pictish rulers.

If the name “Tristram Coffin” sounds weirdly familiar to you, you aren’t nuts — more than a few American men have borne this exact name. All are descendants of Tristram Coffyn, an immigrant from England who was one of the first settlers of Nantucket. In fact, the original Tristram Coffyn (c.1608-1681) was the great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather of actor Tris Coffin (1909-1990), born in a mining town in Utah three centuries later. (Another bearer was folklorist Tristram P. Coffin.)

Do you like the name Tristram? Do you like it more or less than Tristan?

Sources: