The Top 100 Analysis

The Rising Names

 

New Entrants to the Top 10

There was only one new entrant to the Top 10 for the girls  this year, with Poppy racing up 6 places to #7, replacing the once-darling of the flower world: Lily, who falls to #12.

As for the boys, Oscar races into the Top 10 to sit at #7, whilst George sneaks back in at #10. They replace Alfie and Riley.

New Entrants to the Top 100

On the boys side there was the most amount of movement into and out of the Top 100. In all, 6 names are new on the boys side:

• Teddy (now #86, up from #141, that’s a massive leap of 55 places)
• Ibrahim (now #89, up from #107)
• Ronnie (now #90, up from #105)
• Felix (now #91, up from #114)
• Austin (now #94, up from 108)
• Albert (now #99, up from #109, which has made me very happy)

As for the girls, there were only 3 new entrants:

• Victoria (now #88, up from #106)
• Darcy (now #93, up from #107)
• Beatrice (now #95, up from #114)

Big Jumps in the Top 100

With Teddy doing so well this year, it may not surprise you to hear that Theodore also made big leaps within the Top 100 after his first entrance last year at #97, jumping up about 20 places to #78. Other big rises for the boys are: Hugo; Reuben; Elijah; Oscar; and Blake, who all rose at least 10 places.

As for the girls, the highest rising name within the Top 100 was Elsie (for the second year rising) who rose about 20 places, also, to break the 50 mark at #47. Elsie first joined the Top 100 in 2011. Nature names fared well in the Top 100, with Willow (15 places), Violet, and Ivy (both 22 places, respectively) also being high risers.

The Falling Names

 

Exiters of the Top 100

And the names they’ve replaced are:

• Rhys (#101)
• Ellis (#103)
• Kayden (#104)
• Bailey (#113)
• Taylor (#118)
• Kyle (#120)

For the girls, this year Sara and Lydia shared the Top 100 spot, thus only two names fell out:

• Caitlin (#114)
• Keira (#110)

Big Falls in the Top 100

It may not surprise the British public to hear Cameron was one of the biggest fallers in 2013, falling 16 places to #93; at this rate, he may drop out altogether for the 2014 list. Other names falling far within the Top 100 are Callum, Liam, Tyler and Riley, all falling at least 10 places each.

For the girls, the big fallers were: Hollie (down 21 places to #75); Paige (down 18 places to #98); Madison (down 17 places to #92); and Amy (down 14 places to #76).

Skylanders

My Spyro figurine

Now, I’m a huge fan of the Spyro video games, moreover, the original PS1 set of games that to this day see plenty of use. Recently I cracked, and joined the Skylanders hype. What is Skylanders? It’s the new Spyro game which integrates toys with video games – you basically take this plastic figurine of Spyro or friend, stick it on this ‘portal’ thing plugged into the console and voilà, the character is introduced into the gameplay. So far, my brother and I have found this of great use for when we’ve almost killed Spyro as we can quickly swap to another figurine with full health.

There are 30 of these figurines which are all called Skylanders, and I thought I’d shared with you some of their names:

Boomer – a troll character, of the tech elemental

Camo – a plant/dragon hybird, of the life elemental

Cynder – a once dark dragon, of the undead elemental

Dino (-Rang) – a dinosaur, of the earth elemental

Gill – a gill-man, of the water elemental

Hex – a female dark elf, of the undead elemental (hey, if people love Rex)

Terra(fin) – a shark, of the earth elemental

A couple of other names of characters which appear in the Skylanders game:

Arbo – a talking-tree-creature-thingie who guides you through some of the levels

Auric – a bear, who appears to be based off Moneybags from the original games

Cali – a cat you rescue early on in the game

Fargus – a Mabu character

Flynn – the hot-air balloon-piloting character from the earlier levels

Hugo – the assistant who guides you through the game

Mabu – the name of a race of bear-like creatures from the first level

Persephone – the fairy, who seems to be based off Zoe from the original games

Rasmes – a dragon character

Wendel – son of Fargus

Babies in the early ’90s

Let’s number-crunch. Courtesy of my sister, I got my hands on the class lists for her year (grade) at school. The names totalled around 150, and when we factor in the sixth form class list, who are two years older, we have a reasonably sized data covering popular baby names for catholics (catholic school) in England in the early 1990s:

British Babies Born Circa 1990-1994

BOYS – ALPHABETICALLY

Aidan +Aiden

Alexander x3 +Alistair +Alisdair

Andrew x2

Ashley x2

Benjamin x2 +Ben

Bryn +Finn

Christopher x2

Connor +Conor

David x4

Hugo +Hugh +Huw

Jack x5

Jacob +Jakub

James x7

John +Jonathan

Joseph x7 +Joe

Joshua x2

Frederick + Freddie

Matthew x2 +Matteaus

Michael x4

Ryan x2

Theodore +Theo

Thomas x7

William x2 +Liam x2

BOYS – NUMERICALLY (3 or more)

Joseph et al = 8

James = 7

Thomas = 7

Daniel = 6

Alexander et al = 5

Jack = 5

Michael = 4

William et al = 4

Benjamin et al = 3

Hugo et al = 3

Matthew et al = 3

GIRLS – ALPHABETICALLY

Alexandra x2 +Alexa

Alice x2 +Alicia

Amy x2

Ana + Anne +Joanne +Leanne +Rhian +Roxanne

Beatrice +Beatrix x2

Cara +Clare +Clara

Caroline +Karolina

Chloe x3

Eleanor x3 +Ellen x2 +Helen x2 +Helena

Elizabeth +Eliza

Emma x2 +Emily

Esther +Esme

Eugenie x2

Frances x2

Hannah x2

Hayley x2

Jennifer x3

Jessica x3

Kathryn +Catherine +Katie x2

Laura x5 +Lauren

Lucy x4

Lily x2 +Lila +Lillian +Lilia

Maria x2 +Marie

Molly +Mollie

Natasha +Sasha x2

Olivia x3

Sarah +Sara

Sophie x3

Vanessa x2

GIRLS – NUMERICALLY (3 or more)

Eleanor et al = 8

Ana et al = 6

Lily et al =5

Kathryn et al = 4

Lucy = 4

Alexandra et al = 3

Beatrice et al = 3

Cara et al = 3

Chloe = 3

Emma et al = 3

Jennifer = 3

Jessica = 3

Natasha et al = 3

Olivia = 3

Philippa = 3

Sophie = 3

MALE/FEMALE

Daniel x6 +Danielle

George x2 +Georgina

Harry +Hattie +Harriet

Phillip +Philippa x3

Valentino +Valentina

THE IRISH GANG

Sean x2 +Shaun +Sian

Sinead +Seamus +Roisin +Bronagh +Lorcan +Ciara x2 +Niall

Patrick x2

THE NOTABLES

The prevalence of Irish names is not taken as uncommon in a catholic school.

Jack was outnumbered by several names: Joseph, James and Thomas. He began his stay at the top of the UK Top 100 list at the end of the decade. Two of the Jacks had the same surname.

Both of the Ashley’s, born when America embraced the name as a female one, were male.

The Eugenie’s were born just after Princess Eugenie, and the Beatrice/trixes born after Princess Eugenie’s sister: Princess Beatrice.

Non of the Lucy’s were a Lucille, Lucienne etc. They were all just Lucy.

The Emma’s outnumbered the Emily.

From personal knowledge:

-None of the Philippa’s in the list shortens their name to Pippa.

-All of the Eleanor’s were nicknamed Ellie.

* In the interests of not boring you all to death with an endless list of data, any name on the class lists which appeared once, without a similar name has been omitted from the data. This accounts for around 30 names out of the roughly estimated 240 names.

20 ‘O’ Names

Currently, a trendy suffix is ‘o’, so in this post I present to you some lovely ‘o’ boys names, some of which you may have heard of, others you won’t.

Amadeo

– Italian meaning lover of God.

Aurelio

– Italian variation of Aurelius, meaning Golden One.

Bruno

– German name meaning brown. Popular throughout Europe, currently #861 in the US.

Claudio

– Italian from Latin meaning lame. Featured in two Shakespeare plays, Much Ado About Nothing and Measure For Measure.

Cosmo

– Greek name meaning universe. The youth of today will likely associate the name with the ditzy, yet lovable character from Fairly Odd Parents.

Diego

– Spanish variaton of James, currently enjoying some popularity, placing it at #75. Dora the Explorer’s cousin is a bearer.

Hugo

– English parents will likely associate this name with bumbling Hugo from cult comedy show Vicar of Dibley. It’s a German name meaning mind, intellect, and currently sits at #409.

Indio

– Not only benefitting form the ‘o’ trend, but also the name trend of place names. Indio is the name of a Californian desert town.

Ivo

– German name meaning yew wood, archer. This is a more energetic name than Ivor.

Jethro

– Hebrew name meaning preeminence. It was also the name of Moses’ father-in-law.

Leo

– This name has Latin origins and means lion. Currently #209.

Mateo

– Spanish variation of Matthew that means gift of God. #229.

Milo

– German name meaning mind, peaceful, calm. #451.

Navarro

– Spanish name meaning from Navarre. It’s also a  surname in the Basque Kingdom, helping it appeal the surname trend as well as the place name one.

Nico

– Greek name, can either stand alone or be a nickname for a Nico- name, such as Nicolo, Nicodemus or maybe even Nicholas. Thus, this name’s popularity could be helped along be appealing the the nickname trend. #585.

Orlando

– Italian version of Roland, and means famous throughout the land. British actor Orlando Bloom shows this name isn’t necessarily for Italians only. Used by Shakespeare, and is currently # 410.

Pablo

– Spanish variation of Paul. Artist Picasso was a famous bearer. #344.

Pedro

– Spanish variation of Peter, and currently not far behind in popularity at #268 (Peter is at #191)

Reno

– Not only a cute moniker, but also the name of a town associated with gambling. That never stopped place names such as Rio, though.

Taddeo

– Charming Italian version of Thaddeus. Personally, this version looks to have more youth than the first.