How popular is the baby name Jefferson 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 Jefferson.
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The Massachusetts island of Nantucket, which sits about 30 miles off the coast Cape Cod, is home to over 14,000 year-round residents (though the population “swells to around 80,000 or more” during July and August).
According to the Nantucket Town Clerk’s office, a total of 158 babies were born on the island in 2023. But we only have access to the names of 108 of these babies. Why?
[B]ecause of a Massachusetts law that separates birth certificates based on the parent’s marital status. If the parents were not married at the time of the birth or the father is not named on the record, the birth certificate is considered a restricted record and is not public.
So, out of the 108 known names, which were the most popular? For girls it was a tie between Leah and Sarah (given to two babies each), and for boys it was a tie between Grayson and Lucas (also given to two babies each).
The 100 other babies were given 100 single-use names:
Tiller caught my eye — it may have come from the English surname (which originally referred to someone who tilled the soil), but, given the location, I’m hoping it was inspired by the tiller of a boat. Maybe Tiller will become the boaters’ version of Taylor/Tyler? :)
Olivia and Liam — the top names in Boston last year — are nowhere to be found on Nantucket’s list, interestingly.
French military leader Napoléon Bonaparte may have spent his life trying to conquer a continent, but that life began and ended on islands.
He was born (as “Napoleone Buonaparte”) on the Mediterranean island of Corsica in 1769 — the same year that France took Corsica from the Republic of Genoa (now part of Italy). He died while in exile on the remote South Atlantic island of Saint Helena in 1821.
In between, Napoléon: attended military school on the mainland, began serving in the French Army, rose to prominence during the French Revolution and the French Revolutionary Wars, became the de facto leader of France in 1799, declared himself Emperor in 1804, and proceeded to build a vast empire via the Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815).
Needless to say, a large number of babies all over the world have been named “Napoleon” since that time.
I don’t want this post to get too crazy, though, so I’ve decided to collect namesakes from just two locations — France and the U.S. — and to stick to the years during which Napoléon was active.
Napoléon’s namesakes in France
Thousands of French babies were named in honor of Napoléon from the mid-1790s to the mid-1810s.
In contrast with namesakes in other countries (like the U.S. and England), most of his French namesakes were given only his first name — not both names — and it was typically combined with one or more traditional French names (e.g., “Louis Napoléon,” “Jean Baptiste Napoléon”).
With that in mind, I went out of my way to find combinations that were a bit more varied…
Napoléon Baillot, b. 1793 in France
Jacques Napoléon Desiré Campa, b. 1795 in France
Napoléon Stéphanie Joseph Therin, b. 1797 in France
Napoléon Joseph Buttin, b. 1799 in France
Napoléon-Jean Demeester, b. 1800 in France
Napoléon Nicolas Senelar, b. 1801 in France
Guillaume Napoléon Pelletier, b. 1802 in France
Willebrod Napoléon Désiré Degrave, b. 1803 in France
Charlemagne Napoléon Lambert, b. 1804 in France
Napoléon Louis François Richounne, b. 1805 in France
Napoléon Parfait Furpille, b. 1806 in France
parfait means “perfect” in French
Bienaimé Napoléon Le Cagneux, b. 1807 in France
bienaimé means “beloved” in French
François Desiré Prosper Napoléon Loiseau, b. 1808 in France
Napoléon La Paix Lemasson, b. 1809 in France
la paix means “peace” in French
Gustave Napoléon Fichet, b. 1810 in France
Esprit Napoléon Houdry, b. 1811 in France
esprit means “spirit” in French
Napoléon Bonaventure Dusautier, b. 1812 in France
Auguste César Napoléon Decoene, b. 1813 in France
Napoléon-Etienne Vernoni, b. 1814 in France
Fructueux Napoléon Artigue, b. 1815 in France
fructueux means “successful” in French
Almost all of the namesakes in this group were boys, but a handful were girls with feminized forms of the name (like Napoléonne, Napoléonide, and Napoléontine).
Several dozen more boys — most of them born early on — were given only the surname:
Jacques Dominique Bonaparte Venkirch, b. 1796 in France
Augustin Bonaparte Joseph Galle, b. 1797 in France
Jean Baptiste Bonaparte Mollard, b. 1798 in France
Séraphin Adolphe Bonaparte Decorne, b. 1799 in France
Alexis Sébastien Bonaparte Poirée, b. 1801 in France
Napoléon had usually been called “General Bonaparte” or “citizen Bonaparte” before mid-1802, when the people of France went to the polls to decide: “Should Napoléon Bonaparte be consul for life?” Millions voted yes, and, after that, “he was generally known as Napoléon rather than Bonaparte.”
Napoléon’s namesakes in the U.S.
Napoléon didn’t wage any wars on North American soil (though he did sell a lot of that soil in 1803, when he let go of the Louisiana Territory for $15 million). Nonetheless, U.S. newspapers paid close attention to him:
Americans were clearly impressed by Napoléon’s achievements, judging by the hundreds of U.S. namesakes born in the late 1790s and first decades of the 1800s. Many of these babies received both his first name and his surname:
A few of the people named Bonaparte (but not Napoléon) did have other given names — like Lucien, and Jerome — that could have been inspired by other members of the Bonaparte family. I found a Josephine Bonaparte Evans (b. 1815), for instance, who was probably named after Napoléon’s first wife.
Another of the relatively few females in this group was Federal Ann Bonaparte Gist (b. 1799), the daughter of Joshua Gist, who served in the Maryland Militia during the Revolutionary War.
Defining “Napoléon” and “Bonaparte”
Other famous men named Napoléon Bonaparte (including Napoleon III) also had namesakes, but it was the original Napoléon Bonaparte who put these two unusual names on the map.
So…what do they mean?
The Italian forename Napoleone has obscure origins, so the meaning isn’t known for certain. One popular theory is that it’s made up of the elements Neapolis, the original name of Naples, and leone, meaning “lion.” When Bonaparte was born in 1769, the name was “relatively common around Genoa and Tuscany,” though it was spelled a variety of ways (e.g., Nabulio, Nabulione, Napulione, Napolionne, Lapulion). The name had been used in his family before; his father’s uncle, for instance, was also named Napoleone.
The Italian surname Buonaparte, on the other hand, is much more straightforward: it’s made up of the elements buona, meaning “good,” and parte, meaning “part, share, portion.”
Was anyone in your family tree named after Napoléon?
John and Rebecca Lamar married in the mid-1790s and lived on a 1,000-acre cotton plantation near Milledgeville, Georgia. They welcomed a total of nine children, four sons and five daughters, whose names were…
Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus (b. 1797)
Mirabeau Buonaparte (b. 1798)
Thomas Randolph (b. 1800)
Evalina (b. 1803)
Jefferson Jackson (b. 1804)
Amelia (b. 1807)
Louisa Elizabeth (b. 1807)
Mary Ann (b. 1814)
Loretto Rebecca (b. 1818)
The boys were named by their paternal uncle, Zachariah — a self-taught bachelor who also lived on the plantation and who,
like many of the men in the old plantation times, gave himself up to the ideal world of literature and history […] So when son after son was born to the head of the house this bookish enthusiast claimed the privilege of naming his infant nephews after his favorite of the moment, and the amiable and doubtless amused parents consented. Thus Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus, Mirabeau Buonparte, Jefferson Jackson, Thomas Randolph, and Lavoisier Legrand (a grandchild) indicate how his interest shifted from history to politics, and from politics to chemistry.
Oldest son Lucius (named for Roman statesman Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus) went on to become a judge. Two of his own sons — Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar II and Jefferson Mirabeau Lamar — had careers in law as well. In fact, Lucius II served on the U.S. Supreme Court from 1888 to 1893.
Second son Mirabeau (named for the Comte de Mirabeau and Napoleon) also went into law initially. Later he got into politics, and ended up becoming the second president of the Republic of Texas. (He was also the first vice president, under Sam Houston.)
I couldn’t find anyone in the family’s third generation named “Lavoisier Legrand,” but one of Mary’s sons was named Lucius Lavoisier (middle name in honor of French chemist Antoine Lavoisier).
Sources:
Mayes, Edward. Lucius Q.C. Lamar: His Life, Times, and Speeches. 1825-1893. Nashville, TN: Publishing House of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, 1896.
If you’re on the hunt for baby names with a numerological value of 8, you’re in luck! Because today’s post features hundreds of 8-names.
Before we get to the names, though — how do we know that they’re “eights” in numerology?
Turning names into numbers
Here’s how to calculate the numerological value of a name.
First, for each letter, come up with a number to represent that letter’s position in the alphabet. (Letter A would be number 1, letter B would be number 2, and so forth.) Then, add all the numbers together. If the sum has two or more digits, add the digits together recursively until the result is a single digit. That single digit is the name’s numerological value.
For instance, the letters in the name Wyatt correspond to the numbers 23, 25, 1, 20, and 20. The sum of these numbers is 89. The digits of 89 added together equal 17, and the digits of 17 added together equal 8 — the numerological value of Wyatt.
Baby names with a value of 8
Below you’ll find the most popular 8-names per gender, according to the latest U.S. baby name data. I’ve further sub-categorized them by total sums — just in case any of those larger numbers are significant to anyone.
8
The letters in the following baby names add up to 8.
Girl name (8)
Boy name (8)
Bea
Abe
8 via 17
The letters in the following baby names add up to 17, which reduces to eight (1+7=8).
Girl names (8 via 17)
Boy names (8 via 17)
Gia, Bo, Afia, Eabha, Cala
Bo, Mac, Cam, Md, Jeb
8 via 26
The letters in the following baby names add up to 26, which reduces to eight (2+6=8).
Girl names (8 via 26)
Boy names (8 via 26)
Leah, Maci, Jana, Pia, Dua, Gema, Calia, Brea, Cami
Eli, Bear, Bode, Obed, Asaad, Adil
8 via 35
The letters in the following baby names add up to 35, which reduces to eight (3+5=8).
There’s no definitive answer, unfortunately, because various numerological systems exist, and each one has its own interpretation of the number eight. That said, if we look at a couple of modern numerology/astrology websites, we see 8 being described as “successful,” “ambitious,” “organized,” “practical,” and “authoritative.”
We can also look at associations, which are a bit more concrete. Here are some things that are associated with the number 8:
Figure 8
Infinity symbol
Analemma (diagram showing the position of the sun over the course of a year)
Figure-eight knot
Octopus (8 arms)
Spider (8 legs)
8-bit computing
8-track cartridge
Eight-ball (in pool)
Magic 8 Ball (fortune-telling toy)
Eight-ender (perfect score in the sport of curling)
What does the number 8 mean to you? What are your strongest associations with the number?
P.S. To see names with other numerological values, check out the posts for the numbers one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and nine.
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