How popular is the baby name Torino 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 Torino.

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Popularity of the baby name Torino


Posts that mention the name Torino

Top baby names in Japan, 2023

Flag of Japan
Flag of Japan

The East Asian island nation of Japan, the 11th most populous country in the world, is currently experiencing population decline due to a low birth rate. Last year, Japan welcomed just 770,747 babies. This year, the count will likely be even lower.

Japan doesn’t release official baby name rankings, but the most popular names in the country right now include Himari and Ema for girls, and Ao and Haruto for boys.

How do we know this?

Because, every year, two Japanese companies — Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance Company and Benesse Corporation — come up with unofficial baby name rankings for Japan using their own data (i.e., the names of the newborns of their own customers/clients).

  • Meiji Yasuda Life’s 2023 rankings account for 6,951 baby girls and 6,957 baby boys born in Japan from January to September, 2023.
  • Benesse’s 2023 rankings account for 141,857 baby girls and 143,259 baby boys born in Japan from January 1 to September 27, 2023.

Each company releases two sets of rankings, in fact.

Why two? Because Japanese names, written using kanji (Chinese characters), are notoriously difficult to read; many have multiple potential pronunciations. So the companies rank baby names both as they’re written and as they’re said aloud (“readings”).

Below you’ll find a whopping eight sets of rankings. They account for two genders, two sources, and two ways of judging popularity: written vs. readings. (I had to turn the rankings into images because my blogging software can’t handle Chinese and Japanese characters.)


Girl names (written)

According to Meiji Yasuda Life, these are Japan’s top girl names. Common readings are in parentheses.

Japan's top baby girl names of 2023, according to Meiji Yasuda Life

[The readings are: Himari, Hinata, Hina; Rin; Tsumugi; Yua, Yuna; Yuina, Yuna; Mio; Mei; Koharu; Hina, Haruna; Ema; Sui, Midori; Yuzuki; Ai, Mana; and Iroha.]


According to Benesse, these are Japan’s top girl names. Benesse also offered each name’s most common reading (transcription in parentheses).

Japan's top baby girl names of 2023, according to Benesse

[The readings are: Himari, Rin, Sui, Tsumugi, Yuina, Hina, Mei, Aoi, Yua, and Riko.]


Girl names (readings)

According to Meiji Yasuda Life, these are Japan’s top girl-name readings:

Japan's top baby girl name readings of 2023, according to Meiji Yasuda Life

[The readings are: Ema, Tsumugi, Mio, Sana, Mei, Koharu, Rio, Ichika, Himari, and Rin.]


According to Benesse, these are Japan’s top girl-name readings:

Japan's top baby girl name readings of 2023, according to Benesse

[The readings are: Ema, Tsumugi, Sana, Mio, Mei, Koharu, Rio, Yui, Aoi, and Himari.]


Boy names (written)

According to Meiji Yasuda Life, these are Japan’s top boy names. Common readings are in parentheses.

Japan's top baby boy names of 2023, according to Meiji Yasuda Life

[The readings are: Ao, Aoi; Haruto, Hinato; Dan, Haru; Ritsu; Aoi, So, Ao; Soma, Fuma; Ren; Nagi, Nagisa; Minato; and Minato.]


According to Benesse, these are Japan’s top boy names. Benesse also offered each name’s most common reading (transcription in parentheses).

Japan's top baby boy names of 2023, according to Benesse

[The readings are: Ren, Ao, Haruto, Minato, Aoi, Asahi, Nagi, Minato, Dan, and Ritsu.]


Boy names (readings)

According to Meiji Yasuda Life, these are Japan’s top boy-name readings:

Japan's top baby boy name readings of 2023, according to Meiji Yasuda Life

[The readings are: Haruto, Minato, Yuito, Aoto, Riku, Sota, Sora, Aoi, So, and Haruki.]


According to Benesse, these are Japan’s top boy-name readings:

Japan's top baby boy name readings of 2023, according to Benesse

[The readings are: Haruto, Minato, Aoto, Riku, Yuito, Sota, Haruki, Sora, Hinata, and Aoi.]


The boy names Ao and Ritsu were given a boost in 2023 by soccer players Ao Tanaka and Ritsu Doan, both of whom helped Japan’s national football team advance during the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.

The names Tsumugi (female), Minato (male), and So/Sou (male) also rose in the rankings. They correspond to the names of characters on the popular drama/romance series Silent, which aired in Japan from October to December, 2022.

Finally, here’s a link to Japan’s unofficial 2022 rankings, if you’d like to compare this year to last year.

P.S. Though none of the names above would be considered kira-kira names — that is, names with highly unorthodox readings — an increasing number of Japanese babies have been given kira-kira names over the last few decades. (Two examples are Girisha and Torino, bestowed by Japanese athlete/politician Seiko Hashimoto in the early 2000s.) Japan recently decided to crack down on the usage of kira-kira names: a law change “will limit readings of the kanji in children’s names to those ‘generally recognizable by society.'”

Sources:

Image: Adapted from Flag of Japan (public domain)

Baby named for Olympic flame, becomes Olympian

Yoshinori Sakai, the final torchbearer at the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.
1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo

The 1964 Summer Olympics — the first Olympics held in Asia — took place in Tokyo, Japan, from October 10 to October 24.

The 1964 Olympics showed the world that Japan had recovered from the devastation of the war and rebuilt itself as a modern, peaceful democracy after an era of military aggression.

On October 5, several days before the lighting of the Olympic cauldron, the Hashimoto family of Hayakita, Hokkaido (Japan’s northernmost main island) welcomed a baby girl.

Her parents, inspired by Olympics, decided to name her Seiko after the Olympic flame, seika.

seika

The Kanji used to write the Japanese word seika are sei, meaning “holy, sacred,” and ka, meaning “fire, flame.” So the word literally means “holy flame” or “sacred flame.”

Seiko’s name uses the first element of seika, plus the kanji ko, meaning “child.”

seiko

Thanks to her name, “[s]he grew up thinking she was born to be an Olympic athlete, while learning to skate on a frozen lake on the family farm.”

She became so good at speed-skating that she was indeed chosen to represent Japan at the Winter Olympics — four times. She competed as a speed skater at the 1984 Winter Olympics in Sarajevo, the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, the 1992 Winter Olympics in Albertville (where she won her only medal, a bronze) and the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer.

But that’s only part of the story.

Because Seiko also took up track cycling (“as part of her off-season training”). She became so good at this second sport that she was chosen to represent Japan at the Summer Olympics three times. She competed as a track cyclist at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, and the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta.

In total, she made seven Olympic appearances — more than any other Japanese female athlete in history.

After retiring from competition, she went into politics, and her positions were often sports-related. For instance, she was appointed president of the Tokyo 2020 organizing committee in early 2021. (The event had been postponed until mid-2021 due to the coronavirus pandemic.)

Seiko also had three children — each born during an Olympic year, and each given an Olympics-inspired name:

  1. Seika, a girl born in 2000 — the year the Summer Olympics were held in Sydney
  2. Girisha (“Greece”), a boy born in 2004 — the year the Summer Olympics were held in Athens
  3. Torino (“Turin”), a boy born in 2006 — the year the Winter Olympics were held in Turin

What are your thoughts on Seiko’s name and life story? (Do you think her life would have been drastically different had she not been named after the Olympic flame?)

P.S. Pictured above is Yoshinori Sakai, who ran the final leg of the Tokyo 1964 Olympic torch relay (and lit the Olympic cauldron). He was born in Hiroshima Prefecture on August 6, 1945 — the day of the atomic explosion — and “was chosen as the last torchbearer to symbolise peace.”

Sources:

How did “Starsky & Hutch” influence baby names in the late 1970s?

The characters Kenneth Hutchinson and David Starsky from the TV series "Starsky & Hutch" (1975-1979).
Hutch and Starsky from “Starsky & Hutch

The main characters of the popular TV series Starsky & Hutch (1975-1979) were a pair of plainclothes police detectives based in Southern California. Neither one was actually from Southern California, though.

Dark-haired Dave Starsky (played by Paul Michael Glaser), who was intense and impetuous, was originally from Brooklyn, New York.

And light-haired Ken “Hutch” Hutchinson (played by David Soul), who was more laid-back and intellectual, was originally from Duluth, Minnesota.

The year the show started airing, both Starsky and Hutch emerged for the first time in the U.S. baby name data:

Boys named StarskyBoys named Hutch
1977309
197645†12
197511*5*
1974..
1973..
*Debut, †Peak usage

A year later, in 1976, the compound name Paulmichael debuted as well.

And, several decades after that, the movie Starsky & Hutch (2004) starring Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson gave the name Hutch (but not Starsky) another boost.

The characters Kenneth Hutchinson and David Starsky from the TV series "Starsky & Hutch" (1975-1979).
Hutch and Starsky from “Starsky & Hutch

So, what do the surnames Starsky and Hutch mean?

I haven’t had any luck tracking down the etymology of the Polish surname Starski/Starsky, but Hutch can be traced back (via the the Middle English personal name Hucche) to the name Hugh, which was derived from a Germanic word meaning “heart, mind, spirit.”

If you were having a son, and you had to name him either Starsky or Hutch, which would it be?

Sources:

P.S. Starsky and Hutch cruised around in a red-and-white Ford Gran Torino nicknamed the “striped tomato.”

Where did the baby name Torino come from in 1970?

Ford Torino advertisement
Ford Torino advertisement

In the early 1970s, the name Torino began popping up in the U.S. baby name data:

  • 1972: 7 baby boys named Torino
  • 1971: 5 baby girls and 8 baby boys [debut] named Torino
  • 1970: 7 baby girls [debut] named Torino
  • 1969: unlisted
  • 1968: unlisted

Why?

Because of a car: the Ford Torino.

Torinos were introduced in late 1967 for the 1968 model year. By 1970, the Torino had become Ford’s primary mid-sized model, replacing the Fairlane.

The Gran Torino, as featured in Starsky & Hutch, came along in late 1971 (model year 1972).

“Torino” is the Italian form of Turin, which is the city at the center of Italy’s automotive industry. The folks at Ford had been kicking around the idea using Torino as a car name since at least the early ’60s. The Ford Mustang (introduced in 1964) was nearly called the Torino, for instance.

What are your thoughts on the baby name Torino?

P.S. Also in 1970, the similar-sounding name Toriano suddenly became popular. I think it had more to do with The Jackson 5 than with the car, though.

Source: Farr, Donald. Ford Mustang: America’s Original Pony Car. Minneapolis: Quarto Publishing, 2016.

Image: Clipping from Life magazine (28 Jul. 1972)