gloria – Nancy’s Baby Names

How popular is the baby name Gloria 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 Gloria.

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Popularity of the baby name Gloria

Posts that mention the name Gloria

July 4, 2024June 28, 2024

Popular baby names in the Philippines, 2022

In 2022, the Philippines welcomed 1,455,393 babies.

What were the most popular names among these babies? Althea and Nathaniel, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority.

Here are the country’s top 10 girl names and top 10 boy names of 2022:

Girl names

Althea, 1,935 baby girls
Angel, 1,388
Samantha, 1,314
Princess, 1,110
Nathalie, 1,094
Chloe, 1,056
Sofia, 1,046
Zia, 984
Athena, 983
Sophia, 973

Boy names

Nathaniel, 1,956 baby boys
Jacob, 1,781
Ezekiel, 1,662
Gabriel, 1,583
Nathan, 1,557
Ethan, 1,359
Noah, 1,322
Liam, 1,198
James, 1,151
Matthew, 1,138

In the girls’ top 10, Zia and Athena replaced Andrea and Angela.

In the boys’ top 10, Noah and Liam replaced Angelo and Zion.

And which baby names saw the biggest jumps in usage?

Noah, which rose from 931 to 1,322 baby boys [2021 to 2022]
Avianna Louise, which rose from 11 to 295 baby girls [2021 to 2022]

Avianna Louise’s extreme increase must be attributable to something, though I’m not sure what.

In lieu of that, here’s some fun data from a 2017 infographic (PDF) showing how beauty queens have influenced girl names in the Philippines over the years.

In 1974 and 1994 — the first two times that the Philippines hosted the Miss Universe pageant — babies were named after both the delegate from the Philippines and the delegate who won the pageant:

Name	Delegate	Usage Increase (baby girls)
Guadalupe	Guadalupe Sanchez Miss Philippines 1974	46 to 87 [1973 to 1974]
Amparo	Amparo Muñoz (of Spain) Miss Universe 1974	127 to 689 [1973 to 1974]
Charlene	Charlene Gonzales Miss Philippines 1994	1,345 to 4,178 [1993 to 1994]
Sushmita	Sushmita Sen (of India) Miss Universe 1994	3 to 535 [1993 to 1994]

And in 1969, 1973, and 2015, the delegate from the Philippines was the winner of the pageant:

Name	Delegate	Usage increase (baby girls)
Gloria	Gloria Diaz Miss Universe 1969	3,100 to 3,413 [1968 to 1969]
Margarita or Margie (not specified)	Margarita “Margie” Moran Miss Universe 1973	1,706 to 2,351 [1972 to 1973]
Pia	Pia Wurtzbach Miss Universe 2015	621 to 925 [2015 to 2016]

A fourth Filipina, Catriona Gray, won Miss Universe (and likewise influenced baby names) in 2018.

Sources: Most Common Baby Names of 2022 – Philippine Statistics Authority (PDF), Registered Live Births in the Philippines, 2022 – Philippine Statistics Authority

Image: Adapted from Flag of the Philippines (public domain)

April 19, 2024July 7, 2024

What gave the baby name Zena a boost in 1980?

If you look at the popularity graph for the baby name Zena, you’ll see two conspicuous increases in usage: the first in the 1960s (thanks to an actress named Zina), the second in the 1990s (thanks to a warrior princess named Xena).

It’s slightly harder to see that Zena doubled in usage from 1979 to 1980, and sustained that elevated usage for several years:

1983: 47 baby girls named Zena
1982: 58 baby girls named Zena
1981: 54 baby girls named Zena
1980: 51 baby girls named Zena
1979: 24 baby girls named Zena
1978: 28 baby girls named Zena
1977: 24 baby girls named Zena

Why?

I think it has to do with advertisements for Zena Jeans — one of the many jeans brands that emerged during the designer jeans craze of the late ’70s and early ’80s. (Other brands included Jordache, Calvin Klein, Gloria Vanderbilt by Murjani, Sergio Valente, Chardon, Sasson, and Brittania.)

Zena’s sexy TV commercials featured good-looking young ladies and the tagline: “If you’re a woman, Zena is you!”

New York-based Zena Jeans was named after co-founder Zena Gilbert, who launched the company in 1978 with her husband Richard.

Zena Gilbert, who had four children (with Richard), hadn’t been able to find reasonably priced jeans with the right fit (i.e., “smaller in the waist and roomier in the hips”). So Richard, who worked in the apparel industry, suggested that they design and manufacture their own line of jeans.

“They turned a modest investment into a $22 million business in two years.”

For Zena Gilbert, “Zena” was a nickname. She was born Zenaida Gromoff on the remote island of St. Paul, which lies several hundred miles off the coast of mainland Alaska. Her father was a Russian Orthodox priest named Elary, and her mother was an Aleut woman named Elisaveta (Elizabeth).

What are your thoughts on the name Zena?

Sources:

Kanner, Bernice. “Designer Jeans Bottom Out.” New York Magazine 17 May 1982: 22-25.
Van Gelder, Lawrence. “The Person Behind a Household Name.” New York Times 27 Sept. 1981, section 11: 2.
Messina, Lynne. “Kelly’s a perfect 3.” Austin American-Statesman 16 Aug. 1980: 54.
SSA

Image: Screenshot of a TV commercial for Zena Jeans

May 11, 2023February 3, 2024

Popular baby names in Ukraine, 2022

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:

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 Names	Boy Names
City of Kyiv	Sofiya 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

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.