What influenced the baby name Dora in England?

Victoria Tower (Palace of Westminster, London, England)

The United Kingdom’s Defence of the Realm Act (DORA) was passed in August of 1914, soon after the outbreak of World War I.

DORA’s initial objective was to reduce the risk of invasion by preventing citizens from “communicating with the enemy” and by securing the country’s “railways, docks [and] harbours.”

Over the course of the war, however, the act was amended multiple times and became increasingly restrictive. Eventually, DORA was being used by the government to censor the press, seize property, widen police powers, lengthen the workday, and reduce alcohol consumption (among other things).

In 1933, an Australian newspaper reported that the baby name Dora had become unfashionable in Britain:

The latest development in public feeling, in Britain, against [the] Defence of the Realm Act is that the name Dora has gone definitely out of favour as a Christian name for girls.

Indeed, historical baby name rankings for England and Wales suggests that, in the years following the war, the usage of Dora did decrease more quickly than the usage of similar-sounding girl names:

1904191419241934
Dora54th59th93rd(not in top 100)
Doris3rd3rd7th33rd
Dorothy5th4th5th11th
Doreen(not in top 100)78th15th8th
Nora55th47th57th(not in top 100)

The earliest top-100 list I could find for Scotland, from 1935, includes Dorothy (22nd), Doreen (40th), Flora (52nd), and Doris (62nd), but not Dora.

Sources:

Image: Adapted from Victoria Tower from the Victoria Tower Gardens by Ozeye under CC BY-SA 3.0.

[Latest update: Sept. 2024]

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