Where did the baby name Eragon come from in 2006?

The character Eragon from the movie "Eragon" (2006)
Eragon from “Eragon“

The curious name Eragon first appeared in the U.S. baby name data in 2006:

  • 2008: 7 baby boys named Eragon
  • 2007: 12 baby boys named Eragon
  • 2006: 5 baby boys named Eragon [debut]
  • 2005: unlisted
  • 2004: unlisted

Where did it come from?

The epic fantasy film Eragon, which opened in theaters in December of that year.

The main character of the movie, Eragon (played by Edward Speleers), was a farm boy who lived in a kingdom ruled by an evil monarch.

One day, Eragon came across a strange-looking egg, which hatched to reveal a blue-colored baby dragon.

The dragon character Saphira from the movie "Eragon" (2006)
Saphira (as an unnamed newborn)

Eragon eventually realized that he was destined to become a Dragon Rider, and — after figuring out how to ride his dragon, and being trained to sword-fight and wield magic — set out to overthrow the king.

When Eragon discovered that he could communicate with his dragon telepathically, he also learned that she had a name:

“You can hear my thoughts!”

“I have waited a thousand years to hear your thoughts. And now you can hear mine. I am Saphira, and you are my rider.”

(Saphira was voiced by Rachel Weisz.)

The characters Saphira (the dragon) and Eragon from the movie "Eragon" (2006)
Saphira and Eragon from “Eragon“

Thanks to the movie, the baby name Saphira saw a significant increase in usage in 2007:

  • 2009: 125 baby girls named Saphira
  • 2008: 145 baby girls named Saphira
  • 2007: 130 baby girls named Saphira
  • 2006: 9 baby girls named Saphira
  • 2005: 6 baby girls named Saphira

And the rare name Roran, which belonged to Eragon’s cousin Roran (played by Christopher Egan), also popped up in the data that year:

  • 2009: 9 baby boys named Roran
  • 2008: 7 baby boys named Roran
  • 2007: 7 baby boys named Roran [debut]
  • 2006: unlisted
  • 2005: unlisted

A fourth character, the elf-princess Arya (played by Sienna Guillory), may have had an influence on baby names as well, but it’s hard to tell — the name Arya was already on the rise around that time.

The movie Eragon was based on the 2002 novel of the same name by Christopher Paolini, who’d started working on the book in the late 1990s (when he just was fifteen years old).

Eragon’s name was created by changing the first letter of the word “dragon.” (Paolini liked that “Eragon” echoed the words “era” and “gone” — as in, “an era gone by.”) Saphira’s name was based on the word “sapphire.”

Sources:

Images: Screenshots of Eragon

Where did the baby name Crue come from in 1988?

Motley Crue's album "Girls, Girls, Girls" (1987)
Motley Crue album

In 1988, the names Crue and Tommylee appeared for the very first time in the U.S. baby name data:

Boys named CrueBoys named Tommylee
1990..
198985
198810*6*
1987..
1986..
*Debut

Both of these debuts can be attributed to the heavy metal band Mötley Crüe.

The band had more than a dozen songs reach Billboard‘s Hot 100 chart from 1984 to 1992. Their two top-ten hits — “Dr. Feelgood” and “Without You” — peaked in 1989 and 1990, respectively. So…what was drawing attention to the names Crue and Tommylee a year earlier, in 1988?

My guess is the song “Girls, Girls, Girls,” which climbed to #12 in the summer of 1987. More importantly, the song’s then-risqué music video — which depicted the Mötley Crüe’s four members (vocalist Vince Neil, guitarist Mick Mars, bassist Nikki Sixx, and drummer Tommy Lee) carousing at a strip club and riding their motorcycles around Los Angeles — was played frequently on MTV.

How did the band come to be called “Mötley Crüe”? Here’s how Vince Neil told the story:

Mick goes, “How about Motley Crew?” and we go, “That’s cool.” I guess somebody had come into a room that Mick was in and said, “Isn’t this a motley-looking crew?” when he was in another band. And we were drinkin’ Löwenbräu at the time and wanted to feel like we were worldly, so we put the umlauts over the letters and misspelled the name Crüe to make it look more European.

(I don’t know if any of the babies named Crue also got the röck döts.)

The particular focus on the name of the band’s drummer (as opposed to its frontman, à la Axl) is likely attributable to Tommy Lee’s second claim to fame: Husband of Heather Locklear. He’d married the actress, who played Sammy Jo Dean on the ’80s prime time soap opera Dynasty, in May of 1986.

Which name do you like more, Crue or Tommylee?

P.S. Mick Mars’ first child, a son born in 1971, was named Les Paul after pioneering guitarist/luthier Les Paul (born Lester William Polsfuss in Wisconsin in 1915).

Sources:

What gave the baby name Dorinda a boost in 1944?

The character Dorinda from the movie "A Guy Named Joe" (1943)
Dorinda from “A Guy Named Joe“

According to the U.S. baby name data, the name Dorinda saw a sharp spike in usage in the mid-1940s:

  • 1946: 72 baby girls named Dorinda [rank: 989th]
  • 1945: 81 baby girls named Dorinda [rank: 841st]
  • 1944: 147 baby girls named Dorinda [rank: 607th]
  • 1943: 22 baby girls named Dorinda
  • 1942: 24 baby girls named Dorinda

It was the fastest-rising baby name of 1944, in fact.

Several Dorinda-like names got a boost around that time as well:

194319441945
Drenda.50†37
Drinda.22*20
Dorenda.11*5
Darenda.9*.
Derinda.7*6
Dirinda.7*.
Durinda.7*6
Derenda.7*6
Darinda..6*
*Debut, †Peak usage

(Dirinda was a one-hit wonder.)

The name Dorinda would have sounded fashionable in the 1940s — a decade during which names like Linda, Brenda, Glenda, and Wanda ranked inside the girls’ top 100. But its sudden trendiness can be traced back to a specific influence: a movie character.

The romance/fantasy film A Guy Named Joe (which did not feature any characters named Joe, incidentally) was released in March of 1944. It went on to become one of the highest-grossing films of the year.

The main character was WWII bomber pilot Pete Sandridge (played by Spencer Tracy). After being killed in action — and leaving behind his girlfriend Dorinda (played by Irene Dunne) — he found himself in the afterlife, where he was told to return to Earth as a guardian angel. His first assignment was a young military pilot named Ted (played by Van Johnson). Eventually, Ted happened to meet, and fall for, a grieving Dorinda — which made things complicated for Pete.

What are your thoughts on the name Dorinda? Would you use it?

Sources: A Guy Named Joe – Wikipedia, A Guy Named Joe (1944) – Turner Classic Movies, 1944 in film – Wikipedia, SSA

Image: Screenshot of A Guy Named Joe

Popular baby names in the Philippines, 2022

Flag of the Philippines
Flag of the Philippines

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

  1. Althea, 1,935 baby girls
  2. Angel, 1,388
  3. Samantha, 1,314
  4. Princess, 1,110
  5. Nathalie, 1,094
  6. Chloe, 1,056
  7. Sofia, 1,046
  8. Zia, 984
  9. Athena, 983
  10. Sophia, 973

Boy names

  1. Nathaniel, 1,956 baby boys
  2. Jacob, 1,781
  3. Ezekiel, 1,662
  4. Gabriel, 1,583
  5. Nathan, 1,557
  6. Ethan, 1,359
  7. Noah, 1,322
  8. Liam, 1,198
  9. James, 1,151
  10. 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:

NameDelegateUsage Increase (baby girls)
GuadalupeGuadalupe Sanchez
Miss Philippines 1974		46 to 87
[1973 to 1974]
AmparoAmparo Muñoz (of Spain)
Miss Universe 1974		127 to 689
[1973 to 1974]
CharleneCharlene Gonzales
Miss Philippines 1994		1,345 to 4,178
[1993 to 1994]
SushmitaSushmita 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:

NameDelegateUsage increase (baby girls)
GloriaGloria 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]
PiaPia 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)