How popular is the baby name Peter 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 Peter.

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Popularity of the baby name Peter


Posts that mention the name Peter

Unusual baby name: Navarana

Navarana, Pipaluk, Peter Freuchen, and Mequsaq
Navarana, Pipaluk, Peter Freuchen, and Mequsaq

I mentioned the name Navarana in the post on Greenlandic names the other day. The name means “the one that alternates between different parties” and can be traced back to the proto-Eskimo root *naverar, “to exchange,” “to trade.”

The name comes from Inuit mythology:

Navarana is the main character in a legend which is known among most Inuit tribes, the name depicts an activity where a person alternated between two different tribes and ended up creating disunity. In Greenland it was a woman between the Norsemen and the Greenlanders, in other Inuit tribes it was an activity between Inuit and Indians.

One real-life Navarana was the first wife of Danish polar explorer Peter Freuchen, who lived for many years in northern Greenland.

Navarana Freuchen was a Greenlandic Inuit woman originally known as Mequpaluk (meaning “little feather”). Around the time she married Peter, in 1911, she changed her name to Navarana — a fitting choice, given her new dual-tribe status.

The couple went on to have two children: a boy named Mequsaq (“featherlike”) in 1915, and a girl named Pipaluk (“little possession”) in 1918.

Sadly, Navarana died of the flu in 1921. But her name was passed down to at least one grandchild — Navarana, Pipaluk’s daughter with then-husband Bengt Häger (a Swedish dance promoter).

What are your thoughts on the name Navarana?

Sources:

Popular baby names in Greenland, 1960s to 2000s

Flag of Greenland
Flag of Greenland

According to Statistics Greenland, the most popular baby names in the country in 2018 were Inuk & Norsaq (boy names) and Ivaana & Malu (girl names).

The year before, in 2017, the top baby names were Inuk and Pipaluk.

Greenland doesn’t release top-10 lists every year, but does occasionally put out a name report. The most recent, published in mid-2011, includes top-10 lists for five recent decades…

Top Baby Names in Greenland, 1960s

Girl Names (1961-1970)Boy Names (1961-1970)
1. Ane
2. Marie
3. Karen
4. Sofie
5. Johanne
6. Kristine
7. Margrethe
8. Dorthe
9. Else
10. Anna		1. Hans
2. Jens
3. Karl
4. Lars
5. Peter
6. Niels
7. Ole
8. Kristian
9. Jørgen
10. Johan

Top Baby Names in Greenland, 1970s

Girl Names (1971-1980)Boy Names (1971-1980)
1. Ane
2. Karen
3. Marie
4. Dorthe
5. Johanne
6. Mette
7. Naja*
8. Susanne
9. Anna
10. Sofie 		1. Hans
2. Karl
3. Jens
4. Peter
5. Lars
6. Niels
7. Thomas
8. Jakob
9. Martin
10. Knud

*Naja means “younger sister (of a male)” in Greenlandic.

Top Baby Names in Greenland, 1980s

Girl Names (1981-1990)Boy Names (1981-1990)
1. Ane
2. Johanne
3. Marie
4. Karen
5. Paninnguaq*
6. Sofie
7. Louise
8. Anna
9. Nivi*
10. Naja		1. Hans
2. Karl
3. Jens
4. Malik*
5. Peter
6. Lars
7. Kristian
8. Ole
9. Thomas
10. Niels

*Paninnguaq means “little daughter,” Nivi means “girl, maiden,” and Malik means “wave.”

Top Baby Names in Greenland, 1990s

Girl Names (1991-2000)Boy Names (1991-2000)
1. Paninnguaq
2. Ane
3. Nivi
4. Naja
5. Ivalu*
6. Pipaluk*
7. Sofie
8. Sara
9. Marie
10. Camilla		1. Malik
2. Hans
3. Karl
4. Jens
5. Peter
6. Kristian
7. Lars
8. Aputsiaq*
9. Inunnguaq*
10. Nuka*

*Ivalu means “sinew,” Pipaluk means “little possession,” Aputsiaq means “snow flake,” Inunnguaq means “little person/human being,” and Nuka means “younger brother (of a male).”

Top Baby Names in Greenland, 2000s (first decade)

Girl Names (2001-2010)Boy Names (2001-2010)
1. Ivaana*
2. Pipaluk
3. Nivi
4. Paninnguaq
5. Ivalu
6. Naasunnguaq*
7. Julie
8. Ane
9. Isabella
10. Kimmernaq*		1. Malik
2. Aputsiaq
3. Minik*
4. Hans
5. Inunnguaq
6. Kristian
7. Nuka
8. Salik*
9. Peter
10. Inuk* and Ivik* (tied)

*Ivaana means “brood egg,” Naasunnguaq means “little flower,” Kimmernaq means “lingonberry,” minik is a glue-like whale oil that is used as a sealing for skin boats, Salik means “the cleanser,” Inuk means “human being” — Inunnguaq from the ’90s list is a diminutive form of Inuk — and Ivik means “(blade of) grass.”

The recent rise of Salik can be traced back to the 1980s:

In the beginning of the ’80s the artist Keld Hansen published a series of children’s books about a boy named Salik, who lived in Greenland in the 1600s. In that same period, Peter Berliner, a psychologist, did a series of radio programs where the main character was named Salik. Statistics Greenland depicted a rise in the number of boys names immediately after that.

The 2011 report includes many other Greenlandic names as well, but I’ll put those into a separate post a few days from now. Until then, which of all the above names do you like best?

P.S. Almost forgot to define Malu and Norsaq from the first sentence! Malu is a short form of Marie-Louise, and a norsaq is a harpoon-throwing stick.

Sources: Statistics Greenland, Greenland in Figures 2018 (PDF), Greenland in Figures 2019 (PDF), Names in Greenland as of 1 July 2011 (PDF), Nordic Names, Search Names – Oqaasileriffik

Image: Adapted from Flag of Greenland (public domain)

Baby born to medieval scholars, named Astralabe

Photo of an astrolabe from the 11th-century Spain.
An astrolabe

Here’s the story of an unusual baby name that was bestowed in Paris during the 12th century.

The parents were French philosopher and theologian Peter Abelard and his brilliant student, Héloïse d’Argenteuil. In the year 1115, they started their infamous love affair (“one of the best known love tragedies of history”). In 1118, they welcomed their only child, a son.

Because he was illegitimate, it fell upon Héloïse to do the naming. She chose Astralabe — after the Astrolabe, a sophisticated navigational instrument being used at that time in the Islamic world (which included much of Spain). Astrolabes could “locate and predict the positions and risings of the sun, moon, planets, and stars.”

In Catholic France, where most babies were named after saints, “Astralabe” was a highly unconventional choice. (One science writer, in 2008, compared Héloïse’s choice to “a woman in a sci-tech backwater today naming her son iPod.”)

Abelard and Héloïse soon married and legitimized Astralabe. But that didn’t stop Héloïse’s outraged relatives from attacking and castrating Abelard. Ultimately, both ended up going into religious life (even though, technically, they remained married).

No one is certain what became of Astralabe, but name-based evidence (a person referred to as “Canon Astralabe” at Nantes Cathedral circa 1150, for instance) suggests that he entered religious life as well.

The word “astrolabe” is ultimately derived from the ancient Greek compound noun astrolabos organon, meaning “star-taking instrument.” Astrolabos is made up of the elements astron, meaning “star,” and lambanien, meaning “to take.”

Sources:

Image: Adapted from Planispheric Astrolabe by the National Museum of American History under CC0 1.0.

The names of Freddie Mercury’s cats

Freddie Mercury holding one of his cats
Freddie holding one of his cats

Freddie Mercury loved cats and owned quite a few. His partner of seven years, Jim Hutton, said that “Freddie treated the cats like his own children.”

So what were the names of his many cats? Freddie’s assistant Peter Freestone (who worked for the Queen singer from 1979 until the end of his life) could remember the names of 10 of them:

  • Dorothy
  • Tiffany
  • Tom
  • Jerry
  • Delilah
  • Goliath
  • Lily
  • Miko
  • Oscar
  • Romeo

All but one — purebred Tiffany, a gift from Freddie’s former fiancée Mary Austin — came from shelters.

But Mercury’s favorite wasn’t Tiffany. It was Delilah. He wrote the song “Delilah” on the album Innuendo (1991) just for her. The lyrics even include a string of meows.

Which of the cat names above is your favorite?

Source: Let’s talk about Freddie Mercury’s cats, the highlight of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’