Roman names were built to say something. A citizen could carry three of them: a personal praenomen, a clan nomen, and a cognomen marking his branch of the family (1). That third name is where the color lives, because cognomina grew out of personal traits, habits, occupations, hometowns and battlefield reputations, so a stammer, a chickpea-shaped nose or a red head could follow a family for generations.
This list runs to 100 Roman last names, from patrician clans like the Julii and the Claudii down to names that survive on a single inscription. Fifty of them have appeared in U.S. birth records: Mariana is the most used, at 261st in 2025, while Pollux is the rarest still charting at 13,410th, or roughly one baby in 333,333 (2).
Each entry gives the origin, meaning, pronunciation and, where the federal data has it, where the name stands today. Read it as a shortlist or as a walk through Roman history.
Popularity at a Glance
The most popular names on this list in the United States, 1965 to 2025: Mariana, Maximus, Octavia, Titus and Julius.
100 Popular Roman Surnames
Become an honorary citizen of the Roman empire with all the best Roman last names ahead.
Aeneas
Aeneas traces back to the Greek Aineias, built on ainein, meaning to praise, with older senses of recognition and story attached to it. Roman mythology gave the name its weight: Aeneas was the Trojan hero born to Prince Anchises and the goddess Venus. Families who choose it today almost always give it to a boy, and it belongs to the same line that produced the Gaelic first name Angus. It is a heavy name to hand a baby, but it wears well on a grown man. It has never been common in U.S. records, which is a large part of what keeps it interesting.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Praiseworthy
- Pronunciation: Eh-NEE-Ahs
- Variations: Aineias
- Popularity: Aeneas ranked 8,263rd for U.S. births in 2025, nowhere near its best rank of 2,559th in 2002.
Afra
Afra began as a Roman nickname given to a woman from Africa, and the label stuck around long enough to become a name in its own right. Arabic reads it differently, as whitish red, and Hebrew adds a third layer with dust or clay. Saint Afra, martyred under Diocletian in the early fourth century, gives it a devotional history most four-letter names cannot match. Three languages, one small name, no nickname required. Africus and Africanus are the masculine forms if you want the fuller version.
- Origin: Latin, Arabic
- Meaning: African
- Pronunciation: AH-Frah
- Variations: Africus, Africanus
- Popularity: Afra ranked 5,416th in the U.S. in 2025, which is also its best rank since it first appeared in the data in 1979.
Albus
Albus was a working family name in ancient Rome before it drifted into Albinus, and it sits beside the surname Weiss with the same plain sense of white. It also turns up on lists of elf names, which is part of why modern readers find it familiar. Anyone raised on wizards will hear the headmaster long before they hear the Latin. It travels comfortably alongside other German boy names, where the Weiss connection still shows.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: White
- Pronunciation: Ael-BUHS
- Variations: Albinus
- Namesakes: James Albus, the American founder of a division of the Manufacturing Engineering Laboratory at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. Jim Albus, an American golfer, and the 1991 Senior Players Championship.
- Popularity: Albus ranked 8,943rd in the U.S. in 2025 and reached its best rank, 5,461st, in 2020.
Amadeus
Amadeus joins the Latin amare, meaning love, to deus, meaning God, so the whole name reads as one who loves God. It came into use as a personal name in the 17th and 18th centuries, which is exactly when the most famous bearer of all, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, arrived. That association is impossible to shake, and most parents who reach for it are not trying to. Amadeo and Amadis soften the edges if the full Latin feels like too much.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: One who loves God
- Pronunciation: Ah-mah-DEY-Ahs
- Variations: Amadeo, Amadis
- Namesakes: Antonije Pušić (known as Rambo Amadeus), a Montenegrin singer who participated in the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest. Amedeo Sebastiani (known as Amadeus), an Italian TV presenter for DeeJay Television.
- Popularity: Amadeus ranked 1,634th in the U.S. in 2025, just off its best rank of 1,275th in 2024.
Amata
Amata rests on the Latin amatus, meaning beloved one, and it is the feminine form of Amatus, which is also a saint’s name. In Roman mythology Amata was the wife of King Latinus, a queen with a temper and a tragedy attached to her. The sound is soft and open, close enough to Amanda to feel current without being common.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Lover
- Pronunciation: Ah-MAA-taa
- Variations: Amado
- Popularity: Amata appeared in the U.S. data once, at 14,462nd in 2016, and has not charted since.
Amulius
Amulius belongs entirely to legend. He seized the throne of Alba Longa from his brother Numitor and lost it to Romulus and Remus, the twins who went on to found Rome. There is no tidy etymology behind the name, only the story, and the story is the reason it survives at all. Read as a surname it sounds severe, which suits a usurper.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: King of Alba Longa
- Pronunciation: Ah-MOO-liy-Uhs
- Popularity: Amulius is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which publishes only names given to at least five babies in a year.
Anatolia
Anatolia comes from the Greek Anatolios, meaning sunrise, and it doubles as the name of the peninsula that makes up the Asian portion of Turkey. The masculine Anatoly is a Russian name for boys, while Anatolia stays feminine in Greek. It has the length and rhythm of Amelia or Natalia without the crowd around it, and it shortens neatly to Ana or Lia.
- Origin: Greek
- Meaning: Break of day
- Pronunciation: Aan-Ah-TOW-liy-Ah
- Popularity: Anatolia charted in the U.S. once, at 14,731st in 2014, and has not returned to the data since.
Antonia
Antonia descends from the Antonius family, one of the great republican clans, and Greek adds the sense of praiseworthy. It has also been read as meaning beautiful, and as a label for someone from Antium, the coastal town south of Rome. Few Roman names have stayed in continuous use this long or spread across this many languages. Toni and Nia are waiting whenever the full four syllables feel formal.
- Origin: Greek, Latin
- Meaning: Priceless
- Pronunciation: Aen-TOW-niy-Ah
- Variations: Antonius
- Namesakes: Helena Antonia, a 16th-century bearded female court dwarf and a lady-in-waiting for Constance of Austria, Queen of Poland. Jarchinio Antonia, a Curaçaoan footballer for the Curaçao national team.
- Popularity: Antonia ranked 1,279th in the U.S. in 2025, down from a best rank of 361st in 1921.
Balbus
Balbus is a cognomen in the oldest Roman sense, a plain description of the man, in this case someone who stammered or lisped. It ran in the family of Augustus’s mother, where it took the feminine form Balba. Roman naming was rarely flattering, and a household could carry a nickname like this for generations without anyone finding it rude.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Stammerer
- Pronunciation: BAAL-Buhs
- Variations: Balba
- Namesakes: Marcus Balbus, a 1st-century Roman praetor and the maternal grandfather of Augustus, the first Roman Emperor. Steven Balbus, an American astrophysicist and co-winner of the Shaw Prize for Astronomy in 2013.
- Popularity: The Social Security Administration has no U.S. record for Balbus; its files list only names reaching five births in a year.
Barbara
Barbara is the feminine of the Latin Barbarus and the Greek Barbaros, words the ancient world used for anyone speaking outside its languages, so the name carries the sense of stranger or foreigner. It is the rare Roman name that became a midcentury household staple, which means it now reads as vintage rather than antique. Barb, Babs and Basia are all sitting inside it. Give it another decade and it will be back on shortlists. It is one of the few entries here that a grandmother and a newborn could plausibly share.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Foreigner
- Pronunciation: BAAR-bah-Rah
- Variations: Barbarus
- Popularity: Barbara ranked 968th in the U.S. in 2025, a long fall from its best rank of 2nd in 1937.
Beatrix
Beatrix began as the Latin Viatrix, the feminine of Viator, meaning voyager or traveler, and later shifted toward beatus, meaning blessed. Both readings survive, which is why you also see it glossed as she who brings happiness. Beatriz carries it into Spanish and Portuguese, and Beatrice puts it among French girl names. Trixie and Bea do the everyday work.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Blessed
- Pronunciation: BIY-ah-Tricks
- Variations: Beatriz
- Namesakes: Saint Beatrix, a 4th-century Roman martyr known as “the traveler.” Jean-Guillaume Béatrix, a French biathlete and silver medalist at the World Championships in 2013.
- Popularity: Beatrix ranked 1,360th in the U.S. in 2025 after touching a best rank of 984th in 2019.
Benedictus
Benedictus takes the Latin benedicere apart into bene, meaning good, and a root for speaking, so the earliest sense was someone well spoken rather than someone blessed. The shorter Benedict does most of the work in English now, with Ben as the obvious landing spot. The full Latin form has the weight of a baptismal register behind it, and it sits comfortably beside other Dutch boy names of the same length.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Blessed
- Pronunciation: Behn-eh-DIYK-tuhs
- Popularity: Benedictus sits below the five-birth line the U.S. name data uses, so no American ranking exists for it.
Brutus
Brutus reads as heavy and muscular in Latin, and it started as Brut, a nickname for a man thought oafish or uncivilized. Marcus Brutus made it permanent, first as the most famous of Caesar’s assassins and then as a character in Shakespeare. That is a great deal of freight for two syllables, so most families meet the name on a dog rather than a son.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Heavy, dull
- Pronunciation: BROO-tuhs
- Variations: Brütüs
- Namesakes: Marcus Brutus, a Roman politician and the most famous assassin of Julius Caesar.
- Popularity: Brutus last appeared in the U.S. data in 2021 at 12,437th, well below its best rank of 3,367th in 1950.
Bursio
Bursio grew out of the Greek bursa, meaning a hide, the sort of trade word that attached itself to a family and never let go. It belonged to a branch of the Julii, the patrician clan Julius Caesar came from, which gives an obscure name unusually good company. You are not going to meet another one.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Hide
- Pronunciation: BUHR-siy-Oh
- Namesakes: Lucius Julius Bursio, a Roman investigator during the 1st-century.
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Bursio. Federal data begins at five births in a year, and the name has never reached it.
Byzantine
Byzantine is barely a surname at all. The word belongs to the Eastern Roman emperors who ruled from Constantinople, and a Byzantine was simply a person from Byzantium. Modern English kept it as an adjective for anything overly detailed, which is a strange afterlife for a place name. Treat it as a curiosity on this list rather than a candidate for a birth certificate.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Overly detailed
- Pronunciation: Biz-ahn-TEEN
- Popularity: Byzantine has never met the five-birth threshold the U.S. data requires, so it goes unranked here.
Caecilius
Caecilius sits on the Latin caecus, meaning blind, and it is the ancestor of the English Cecil. The Caecilii were real and well documented, from the Pompeiian banker Lucius Caecilius Iucundus to the letter-writer Pliny the Younger. Its feminine form gave the world Saint Cecilia, patron saint of music, which is the version most people recognize. Its four flat syllables give the whole name a rhythm modern names rarely carry.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Blind
- Pronunciation: Kay-KIHL-ee-Uhs
- Variations: Caecilia
- Namesakes: Lucius Caecilius Iucundus, a 1st-century banker whose house is still standing in Pompeii. Gaius Caecilius (known as Pliny the Younger), an ancient Roman lawyer and magistrate.
- Popularity: Unranked in the U.S. data, which counts a name only once at least five babies share it in a year.
Caesar
Caesar comes from the Latin caesaries, meaning long-haired, which is a modest origin for the most loaded name in Roman history. After Julius Caesar the word stopped being a family name and became a title, and it traveled far enough to turn into Kaiser in German and Czar in Russian. It is also a steady first name for boys in Hispanic families, usually spelled Cesar. Few names carry two thousand years of authority this lightly. It is a name that arrives with expectations already attached to it.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Head of hair
- Pronunciation: SEE-Sare
- Namesakes: Pogus Caesar, a British TV producer for the BBC. Irving Caesar (born Isidor Keiser), an American lyricist inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1972.
- Popularity: Caesar ranked 2,843rd in the U.S. in 2025, down from a best rank of 838th in 1913.
Carina
Carina means pretty or cute in Italian and dear once you follow it back to the Latin carus. It is also the name of a constellation of stars in the southern sky, which gives it a second life for parents drawn to celestial names. It has always worked better as a first name than as a surname.
- Origin: Latin, Italian
- Meaning: Beloved
- Pronunciation: Kah-REEN-uh
- Variations: Carino
- Popularity: Carina ranked 1,572nd in the U.S. in 2025, well off its best rank of 383rd in 1995.
Cassia
Cassia is the feminine of Cassius, one of the old Roman clan names, and it also belongs to a tree whose bark carries the smell of cinnamon. That double life, patrician family and warm spice, is why it feels inviting rather than severe. It has quietly become a first name in its own right, helped along by Cass.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Dear, beloved
- Pronunciation: KASH-uh
- Variations: Cassius
- Popularity: Cassia ranked 2,022nd in the U.S. in 2025, its best rank since it first charted in 1954.
Cato
Cato rests on the Latin catus, shrewd or all-knowing, and it belonged to two of Rome’s most quoted moralists. It has a second, unrelated life as an occupational name for a scribe in Serbo-Croatian, and it turns up as Catoe in English and Scottish records. Two syllables, hard consonants, nothing to shorten. It reads as plain and modern, nothing about it needing explanation. Cato the Elder was the first Roman to write history in Latin, which is the sort of credential a name holds on to.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: All-knowing
- Pronunciation: KAY-toh
- Namesakes: Marcus Porcius Cato (known as Cato the Elder), a Roman historian and the first to write history in Latin. Diomedes Cato, an Italian-Polish composer, known for late Renaissance and Baroque style music.
- Popularity: Cato ranked 2,804th in the U.S. in 2025, close to its best rank of 2,448th in 1917.
Catullus
Catullus is a diminutive of Cato, so the base sense is prudent and experienced. Two other roots have been proposed: the Latin-Gaulish catu, meaning battle, and the Latin catulus, meaning puppy. A name that might mean battle and might mean puppy is doing a great deal at once. The poet Gaius Valerius Catullus is the reason anyone still says it out loud.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Skillful
- Pronunciation: Kah-TOH-luh
- Namesakes: Gaius Valerius Catullus, a late Roman poet known for the neoteric style of poetry.
- Popularity: Catullus is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which lists only names given to five or more babies in a year.
Centho
Centho names a piece of kit, the padded cap worn under a helmet, which tells you how literal Roman nicknames could be. It belonged to the Claudii, one of the most powerful families of the republic and the same clan behind the female name Claudia. Cento is the shorter spelling if the full form feels like too much.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Cap worn under the helmet
- Pronunciation: SEN-Thow
- Variations: Cento
- Namesakes: Gaius Claudius Centho, a Roman dictator in 213 BCE.
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Centho; the federal files start at five births in a year.
Cicero
Cicero comes from the Latin ciceris, meaning chickpea, and tradition says it was pinned on an ancestor whose nose carried a cleft the shape of one. The orator Marcus Tullius Cicero made it famous enough to outlast the republic, and it became an Italian surname read as descendant of Cicero. It still sits comfortably among Italian boy names, stretched to Cicerone in its longer form. The director Fernando Cicero kept it in circulation on screen in the last century. It also sounds gentler in speech than it looks on the page.
- Origin: Latin, Italian
- Meaning: Chick pea
- Pronunciation: CIS-ah-Row
- Variations: Cicerone
- Namesakes: Marcus Tullius Cicero, a Roman statesman and one of Rome’s greatest orators. Fernando Cicero, an Italian director of Spaghetti Western films.
- Popularity: Cicero ranked 12,400th in the U.S. in 2025, far below its best rank of 1,108th in 1920.
Clineas
Clineas is about as obscure as a Roman name gets, attached to the Claudii clan and to a single man: Marcus Claudius Clineas, the lieutenant who negotiated a peace with the Corsicans and may have been executed or banished for it. No agreed meaning has survived. What is left is the shape of the name and a story with a bad ending.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Unknown
- Pronunciation: Clih-NEY-ahs
- Namesakes: Marcus Claudius Clineas, a Roman lieutenant in the 3rd-century who arranged a peace agreement with the Corsicans.
- Popularity: Clineas has never met the five-birth threshold the U.S. name data requires.
Corvinus
Corvinus builds on the Latin corvus, meaning raven, with the -inus ending Roman sons used to mark descent from a father or grandfather. So the name reads as the little raven, the younger raven, the raven’s boy. It sounds like something invented for a film villain, which is a compliment where dark, sharp names are concerned. Corvin trims it for everyday use.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Little raven
- Pronunciation: KAOR-viy-Nahs
- Variations: Corvin
- Namesakes: Marcus Valerius Corvinus, a 1st-century Roman general, and patron of literature and art.
- Popularity: Corvinus sits below the publication line for U.S. birth data, so it carries no American rank.
Decimus
Decimus means tenth, one of a whole set of Roman names lifted straight from the counting numbers. The Julii used it, the same clan that produced Julius Caesar, and it came back in Victorian households large enough to need a tenth name. Practical, unsentimental and oddly appealing now that families of ten are rare.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Tenth
- Pronunciation: DES-ih-Mahs
- Popularity: Decimus ranked 9,109th in the U.S. in 2025, close to the best rank of 8,904th it set in 2006, its first year in the data.
Delphi
Delphi passes through the Latin Delphinus but starts as the Greek name of the sanctuary where the oracle spoke. The root carries both womb and dolphin, which is less strange than it sounds once you know the story: Apollo rode a dolphin from Crete to Delphi and killed the she-serpent Delphyne there. Two syllables and a hard consonant give it a crisp, modern edge despite the ancient root.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Hollow
- Pronunciation: DEL-fIhy
- Variations: Delphine, Delphy
- Popularity: Delphi last appeared in the U.S. data in 2024 at 15,881st, below the best rank of 11,379th it reached in 2021.
Demetrius
Demetrius is the Latin form of the Greek Demetrios, a name given to worshipers of Demeter, goddess of the harvest. Roman writers matched her to Ceres, so the name also reads as belonging to Ceres. Popes and novelists have carried it, and the shorter Demetris and Dimitri travel with it wherever it goes. Pope Demetrius II of Alexandria and the Romanian novelist Lucia Demetrius show how far it traveled. Dee is the everyday shortcut.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Devoted to Demeter
- Pronunciation: Deh-MIY-triy-Ahs
- Variations: Demetrios, Dimitrios, Dimitris
- Namesakes: Pope Demetrius II of Alexandria, the 111th Pope of Alexandria & Patriarch of the See of St. Mark. Lucia Demetrius, a Romanian novelist, and winner of the State Prize in 1951.
- Popularity: Demetrius ranked 1,229th in the U.S. in 2025, down from a best rank of 259th in 1991. Measured across the last 10 years of births against the 10 before them, it is the steepest faller on this list, off about 36 percent.
Ephesus
Ephesus is a place before it is a name, the great port city on the coast of what is now Turkey. Legend credits its founding to a tribe of Amazons and gives it the name of their queen, Ephesia. As a surname it is close to unheard of, and it would read as a statement rather than a family label.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Citizen of Ephesus
- Pronunciation: EHF-ah-Sahs
- Popularity: Ephesus is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which publishes only names given to at least five babies in a year.
Evander
Evander is the English shape of the Latin Evandrus, and Gaelic families have long treated it as a cousin of Ivor. Mythology puts him in Arcadia, the hero who founded the settlement on the ground Rome would later occupy. Norse offers an unrelated reading, meaning bow warrior. At 698th in 2025 it is at its own best rank yet. It is easy to say, easy to spell, and it carries a myth most people have never heard.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Good man
- Pronunciation: Eh-VAN-duhr
- Variations: Evandrus
- Popularity: Evander ranked 698th in the U.S. in 2025, its best rank in the federal data since it first charted in 1888.
Fabius
Fabius traces to the Latin faba, the humble bean, and the Fabii took their clan name from it. Mythology gave the family a grander origin story, calling Fabius a son of Hercules. Today it survives mostly through Fabian, and through the French prime minister Laurent Fabius. Roman clans were rarely embarrassed by a vegetable.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Bean
- Pronunciation: FAEB-iy-Ahs
- Variations: Fabian
- Namesakes: Laurent Fabius, the Prime Minister of France from 1984 to 1986.
- Popularity: Fabius has surfaced in the U.S. data only once, at 4,580th in 1971.
Falto
Falto belonged to the Valerii, one of Rome’s oldest patrician clans, and it later smoothed into Falco, meaning falcon. The less flattering reading is the original one: a nickname for someone pigeon-toed. Roman cognomina were built out of exactly this kind of teasing, and the family kept it anyway.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Falcon
- Pronunciation: FAULTOW
- Variations: Falco
- Popularity: Falto sits below the five-birth line the U.S. name data uses, so no American ranking exists for it.
Flaccus
Flaccus means flabby or droopy, and the first man to carry it was almost certainly known for his ears. It stayed in use regardless, attached to a composer whose work is the only music to survive from ancient Rome and to a senator who commanded the Rhine army. Flacco is the Italian descendant. A Roman family would rather keep an unkind nickname than lose the lineage attached to it.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Flap-eared
- Pronunciation: FLACK-uhs
- Variations: Flacco
- Namesakes: Flaccus, a 2nd-century BC Roman composer of the only music to survive ancient Rome. Marcus Flaccus, a Roman senator and commander of the Rhine army during the Batavian rebellion.
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Flaccus. Federal data begins at five births in a year, and the name has never reached it.
Flamen
Flamen is a job title before it is a name. A flamen served one particular god, responsible for that cult and no other, and once emperors were declared divine they were given flamens of their own. As a surname it is severe and unusual, and it earns its place on this list as a piece of Roman religion rather than a naming trend.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Roman priest
- Pronunciation: FLEY-mehn
- Popularity: Flamen has never met the five-birth threshold the U.S. data requires, so it goes unranked here.
Florentina
Florentina is the feminine of the Roman Florentius, built on florens, meaning blooming. It worked as a place name too, marking a woman from Florence. Four syllables is a commitment, though Flora, Tina and Flor are all sitting inside it. Florentine is the shorter European variant. It reads as European rather than antique, which is a useful distinction for a name this old.
- Origin: Latin, Italian
- Meaning: Blooming
- Pronunciation: Flo-rehn-TINE-ah
- Variations: Florentine
- Popularity: Florentina ranked 8,028th in the U.S. in 2025, a long way below its best rank of 1,516th in 1928.
Frugi
Frugi is the Latin word for thrifty, and as a cognomen it was a compliment: worthy, honest, useful. It marked a man who did not waste, in a culture where public restraint was a political asset. It has stayed rare enough that U.S. birth records have never picked it up at all.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Frugal
- Pronunciation: FROO-gee
- Namesakes: Lucius Frugi, a 1st-century Roman politician and consul in 133 BC.
- Popularity: Unranked in the U.S. data, which counts a name only once at least five babies share it in a year.
Fulgencio
Fulgencio is the Spanish form of the Latin Fulgentius, from fulgens, meaning shining. A fifth-century saint carried it first, which is how it moved out of Roman Latin and into Spanish given names. It is warm and rhythmic to say, and it has stayed a surname far more often than a first name.
- Origin: Latin, Spanish
- Meaning: Brilliant
- Pronunciation: Ful-GENN-siy-Ow
- Variations: Fulgentius
- Namesakes: Edgardo Fulgencio, a Filipino basketball player who competed in the 1948 Summer Olympics. Ruth Fulgencio, a Spanish Paralympic athletics competitor who competed at the 2012 Summer Paralympics.
- Popularity: Fulgencio last charted in the U.S. in 1991 at 6,768th, below the best rank of 2,840th it held in 1955.
Geminus
Geminus comes from the Latin gemellus, meaning double or paired, and it is the root behind Gemini and the twins on the zodiac. Romans used it as a cognomen for a twin, plainly and without ceremony. The astronomer Geminus of Rhodes is the best known bearer.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Twin
- Pronunciation: GEH-mih-Noos
- Variations: Gemini
- Namesakes: Geminus of Rhodes, a Greek astronomer who wrote Introduction to the Phenomena.
- Popularity: Geminus is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which lists only names given to five or more babies in a year.
Hadriana
Hadriana marks a person from Hadria, the ancient city in northern Italy. It is the feminine of Hadrian and the older shape of Adriana, which is the version nearly everyone uses now. Keeping the H makes it look Roman rather than modern, and it is the whole reason to choose this spelling.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: From Hadria
- Pronunciation: Hay-driy-AH-nah
- Variations: Hadrian
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Hadriana; the federal files start at five births in a year.
Helenus
Helenus rests on the Greek helane, meaning torch, alongside hele, the brightness of the sun. Myth hands it to a son of Zeus and Lysithea, a prophet who fought on the Achaean side at Troy. It is the masculine of Helena, and it keeps the same light in it.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Torch
- Pronunciation: HEH-leh-Noos
- Variations: Helena
- Popularity: Helenus has never met the five-birth threshold the U.S. name data requires.
Helvia
Helvia comes from the Latin helvus, meaning honey-yellow, a shade Romans used for hair and for horses alike. It may also connect to the Helvii, a Celtic tribe settled near the Rhone. As a girl’s name it is soft, short and almost entirely unused, which is the appeal.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Blond hair
- Pronunciation: HEHL-viy-Ah
- Popularity: Helvia sits below the publication line for U.S. birth data, so it carries no American rank.
Hortensia
Hortensia is the feminine of the Roman Hortensius, from hortus, meaning garden, and it is also the botanical name for the hydrangea. That makes it a flower name with a Roman senate standing behind it. Hortense carries it into French, where it sits among French girl names with a nineteenth-century ring to it.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Of the garden
- Pronunciation: Hor-TEHN-siy-Ah
- Variations: Hortense
- Popularity: Hortensia last charted in the U.S. in 1995 at 14,249th, long after its best rank of 909th in 1928.
Isthmus
Isthmus is a geography word wearing a name’s clothes. The Greek term means neck, and the Isthmus of Corinth is the strip of land joining the Peloponnese to mainland Greece. As a name it is more concept than tradition, and it belongs here as an example of how freely Latin and Greek vocabulary crossed into Roman naming.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Neck
- Pronunciation: IHS-muhs
- Popularity: Isthmus is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which publishes only names given to at least five babies in a year.
Italus
Italus is the personal form of Italy itself. Ancient writers connected it to the Itali, the tribe whose territory eventually lent its name to the whole peninsula, and Roman legend kept the name tangled up in the founding stories of the region. Italia is the feminine. It is a patriotic name in the most literal sense available.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Of Italy
- Pronunciation: Ih-TAAHL-uhs
- Variations: Italia
- Popularity: The Social Security Administration has no U.S. record for Italus; its files list only names reaching five births in a year.
Janus
Janus is the two-faced Roman god of doorways, one face looking back and one looking forward, invoked at the start of things. Beginnings, endings, gates and passages all sat under his authority. In Poland it is also a Polish name built on Jan, with Janos as the Hungarian cousin. Few names arrive with a better metaphor attached.
- Origin: Latin, Polish
- Meaning: Archway
- Pronunciation: JHAEN-ahs
- Variations: Janos
- Namesakes: Krzysztof Janus, a Polish footballer for Wisła Płock II. Michael Janus, an American politician in the Mississippi House of Representatives from 1996 to 2009.
- Popularity: Janus last charted in the U.S. in 2019 at 12,967th, below the best rank of 4,622nd it reached in 1922.
Julius
Julius is the clan name of the Julii, traced in legend to Iulus, the son of Aeneas. The Greek reading is downy-bearded, the first growth on a young man’s face, while the Latin line reads it as devoted to Jove. One dictator later it became the most recognizable family name in Roman history, and it has never really left western use. It is formal without being stiff, and Jules is the obvious short form.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Downy-bearded
- Pronunciation: JHUW-liy-Ahs
- Variations: Julianus
- Namesakes: Churchill Julius, an English Anglican cleric and the first Archbishop of New Zealand. Leigh Julius, a South African sprinter who competed at the 2008 Summer Olympics.
- Popularity: Julius ranked 424th in the U.S. in 2025, down from a best rank of 106th in 1913. It is one of the five names drawn on the chart above.
Junia
Junia is the feminine form used by the Junii, one of the most prominent clans of the republic, and the family name looks back to Juno, queen of the Roman gods. A first-century Junia is named in Paul’s letter to the Romans, which kept the name alive in Christian tradition long after the clan itself faded. It sounds like June with an extra beat, and it is far less used.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Born in June
- Pronunciation: JUW-niy-Ah
- Variations: Junius
- Namesakes: Junia, a 1st-century Christian mentioned in the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Romans.
- Popularity: Junia ranked 1,998th in the U.S. in 2025, its best rank yet, having first appeared in the data in 1883.
Juventus
Juventus is the Latin iuventus, meaning youth, and the name of the goddess Romans credited with keeping the young strong. For most of the world it now means a football club in Turin, which is a hard association to compete with. As a surname it is more idea than family line.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Youthful
- Pronunciation: Juw-VEHN-tuhs
- Popularity: Juventus sits below the five-birth line the U.S. name data uses, so no American ranking exists for it.
Laurentius
Laurentius is the Latin behind every Lawrence, Lorenzo and Lars in Europe, marking a man of Laurentium. The Italian De Laurentiis carries the same root and means a member of the Laurenti family. It is long, formal and unmistakably ecclesiastical, which suits a name once worn by an antipope.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Of Laurentium
- Pronunciation: Lao-REHN-tahs
- Variations: De Laurentiis, Laurentia
- Namesakes: Laurentius, the 5th-century antipope of the See of Rome. Henrik Laurentius Helliesen, the Norwegian Minister of Finance between 1863 and 1883.
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Laurentius. Federal data begins at five births in a year, and the name has never reached it.
Lepidus
Lepidus pulls in two directions: lapideus, made of stone, and lepidus, pleasant or charming. Romans used the second sense for a man who was good company and better conversation. Marcus Lepidus, who shared power with Octavian and Mark Antony, is the reason the name outlived the republic. Charming and stony is a fair description of most Roman politics.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Stony
- Pronunciation: LAE-pih-Dihs
- Variations: Lepidi
- Namesakes: Marcus Lepidus, a Roman general who formed a ruling coalition in the Roman Republic with Octavian and Mark Antony.
- Popularity: Lepidus has never met the five-birth threshold the U.S. data requires, so it goes unranked here.
Livia
Livia belonged to the empress the Romans called the most powerful woman in the empire, which is a great deal of authority for five letters. The root is the Latin livere, carrying a sense of envy and of a bluish cast. Today it doubles as a short form of Olivia, and that is how most American families arrive at it. Chosen on its own it feels deliberate rather than borrowed. Livius is the masculine form, and it is just as underused.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Blue
- Pronunciation: LIHV-iy-Ah
- Variations: Livius
- Popularity: Livia ranked 820th in the U.S. in 2025, close to its best rank of 667th in 2014.
Lucilius
Lucilius grows out of Lucius, the light name, and it was first recorded around Lazio. It later shortened into the medieval surname Luciani. Gaius Lucilius, the earliest Roman satirist, is the bearer worth knowing. Lucius does the same work in half the syllables.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Light
- Pronunciation: Lew-CIYL-iy-Uhs
- Variations: Lucillus
- Namesakes: Gaius Lucilius, a 1st-century Roman writer and the earliest Roman satirist.
- Popularity: Lucilius is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which publishes only names given to at least five babies in a year.
Maia
Maia belonged to the Roman goddess of spring and growth, and the month of May takes its name from her. The Latin maius, meaning larger, sits underneath it, which fits a goddess who personified things getting bigger. In Portuguese it works as a surname, carried by musicians and fighters alike. Two syllables, one clean vowel sound, nothing to explain.
- Origin: Latin, Portuguese
- Meaning: Goddess of spring
- Pronunciation: MAEY-Ah
- Variations: Maias
- Namesakes: Luiz Maia, a Brazilian musician, and father of the modern Brazilian bass. Demian Maia, a Brazilian mixed martial artist who competed in the Welterweight division of the Ultimate Fighting Championship.
- Popularity: Maia ranked 433rd in the U.S. in 2025, just off its best rank of 420th in 2022.
Manius
Manius comes from the Latin mane, meaning the morning, and Romans gave it to children born at daybreak. Both patrician and plebeian families used it. The literal reading is the appealing part: a name that simply records when a child arrived.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Morning
- Pronunciation: MAEN-iy-Ahs
- Variations: Manus
- Popularity: The Social Security Administration has no U.S. record for Manius; its files list only names reaching five births in a year.
Marcellus
Marcellus is a diminutive built on Mars, the god of war, so the sense lands as young warrior. Marcus Claudius Marcellus, consul of the republic, made it a name worth inheriting, and two popes later carried it. Marcel is the French trim, and Marc sits inside both of them. It has more music in it than most of the hard-edged Roman names, which is why it reads as a first name now rather than a surname. Robert Marcellus, principal clarinetist of the Cleveland Orchestra, is the modern bearer worth knowing.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Young warrior
- Pronunciation: Maar-SEHL-ahs
- Variations: Marcel
- Namesakes: John Marcellus, a Canadian politician in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta in the early 20th-century. Robert Marcellus, an American musician and principal clarinetist of the Cleveland Orchestra.
- Popularity: Marcellus ranked 1,054th in the U.S. in 2025, below its best rank of 730th in 1916.
Mariana
Mariana is the feminine of Marianus, which became Mariano in Italian, and the family behind it was one of several Roman lines tied to Mars. Later use pulled it toward Maria, so it now reads as a Marian name to most ears. It is the most used name on this entire list among American babies, and it works in Spanish, Portuguese and English without a single adjustment. Marianus is the masculine original. For a Roman name it is remarkably unfussy.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Of the sea
- Pronunciation: MAH-riy-AEN-Ah
- Variations: Marianus
- Popularity: Mariana ranked 261st in the U.S. in 2025, the highest current rank of any name on this list, and its best rank was 165th in 2005.
Martinus
Martinus is the Latin ancestor of Martin and Martinez, and it belongs to Mars, which is why it reads as warlike or martial. A name like this suited a soldier or a commander, and the army was where most Roman families made their reputation. It has spread further than almost any other name here, though it dropped its Latin ending along the way.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: War-like
- Pronunciation: Maar-TIY-Nahs
- Variations: Martin, Martinez
- Namesakes: Flavius Martinus, a 4th-century deputy in Roman Britain under Constantius II. Derek Martinus (born Derek Buitenhuis), a British TV director best known for the Doctor Who series.
- Popularity: Martinus last appeared in the U.S. data in 1993 at 8,310th, below the best rank of 5,191st it set in 1970.
Maximus
Maximus was a Roman title before it was a name, the superlative attached to the highest priests and the most decorated commanders. Modern parents met it through Gladiator, and it moved into wide American use in the years right after the film. Max is the built-in nickname, which is a large part of why it stuck. It is also one of the five names on the chart above. Maxim is the shorter European variant if the full form feels theatrical.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Greatest
- Pronunciation: MAKK-siy-Mahs
- Variations: Maxim
- Namesakes: Maximus of Ephesus, a 4th-century philosopher and teacher of emperor Julian. Flattus Maximus, the stage name for the American guitarist in the heavy metal band Gwar.
- Popularity: Maximus ranked 276th in the U.S. in 2025, close to its best rank of 187th in 2016, and it first charted in 1997.
Messala
Messala points at the medlar, a small tree in the rose family, but Roman writers preferred the other story: a consul took the name for himself after capturing the Sicilian city of Messana. Cognomina were often earned that way, on campaign rather than at birth. Messalla with the double L is the classical spelling.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Rose tree
- Pronunciation: Meh-SAA-lah
- Variations: Messalla
- Namesakes: Marcus Messala, a 2nd-century Roman senator and consul. Ennodius Messala, an Italian senator, made counsel in 506 CE.
- Popularity: Messala sits below the five-birth line the U.S. name data uses, so no American ranking exists for it.
Muzaka
Muzaka is Albanian more than Roman, taken from the Muzeqe region and carried by the noble family that ruled it through the Middle Ages. It is also read as pure. Its place on a Roman list comes from the long Latin footprint across the Adriatic rather than from the city itself. Rare in every direction, and almost never used for girls anywhere.
- Origin: Latin, Albanian
- Meaning: Unknown
- Pronunciation: Moo-ZACK-ah
- Variations: Muzyka
- Namesakes: Gjergji Muzaka, an Albanian footballer for the Albanian national team in 2008.
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Muzaka. Federal data begins at five births in a year, and the name has never reached it.
Narcissus
Narcissus comes from the Greek Narkissos, built on narke, meaning sleep or numbness. The myth is the part everyone knows: a beautiful young man fell in love with his own reflection and became the flower that carries his name. A wrestler of the same name assassinated the emperor Commodus, which is a very different legacy for one word to hold. Narciso is the Italian and Spanish form.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Daffodil
- Pronunciation: Naar-CIS-uhs
- Variations: Narciso
- Namesakes: Narcissus, a 2nd-century Roman wrestler who assassinated the Roman emperor Commodus.
- Popularity: Narcissus last charted in the U.S. in 1961 at 6,352nd, below the best rank of 2,230th it reached in 1919.
Neptune
Neptune belongs to the Roman god of the sea, Neptunus in Latin, and the root nebh underneath it means wet or damp. The eighth planet took the name in the modern era, so the word now works in two registers at once. It has only just begun to appear on American birth certificates, which is new territory for a Roman god.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: God of the sea
- Pronunciation: NEHP-toone
- Namesakes: Yvon Neptune, the Prime Minister of Haïti from 2002 to 2004.
- Popularity: Neptune ranked 9,453rd in the U.S. in 2025 and first appeared in the data only in 2021, with a best rank of 8,785th in 2022.
Nero
Nero means black in Latin and began as a nickname for a dark-haired man. In Italian it also reads as descendant of Neri, and it survives in surname forms like Lo Nero. The fifth emperor is the association nobody escapes, fiddle and all. The sound itself is clean and modern, which is why the name keeps resurfacing despite the history attached to it. Franco Nero carried it through a career of Westerns, which is a lighter legacy than the emperor’s.
- Origin: Latin, Italian
- Meaning: Black
- Pronunciation: NIY-roh
- Variations: Lo Nero, Neri
- Namesakes: Nero, the fifth Roman emperor from 54 to 68 CE. Francesco Sparanero (known as Franco Nero), an Italian actor best known for the Spaghetti Western film Django (1966).
- Popularity: Nero ranked 4,815th in the U.S. in 2025, below its best rank of 2,825th in 1918.
Numitor
Numitor is the deposed king of Alba Longa and the grandfather of Romulus and Remus, restored to his throne once the twins grew up. The plebeian family name Numitoria came from the same root, and a Lucius Numitorius carried an early version of it in the fourth century. It pairs with Amulius on this list as the other half of a family quarrel that founded a city.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: King of Alba Longa
- Pronunciation: NOO-mih-Tor
- Popularity: Numitor has never met the five-birth threshold the U.S. data requires, so it goes unranked here.
Octavia
Octavia means eighth, and the Octavii were a plebeian family raised to patrician rank by Julius Caesar. The best known Octavia was Octavian’s sister, married to Mark Antony in a match that was as much treaty as marriage. Some families still use it for an eighth child, though most now choose it for the sound. Via and Tavi are the natural short forms, and the name is climbing faster than anything else here. Octavian is the masculine form listed alongside it.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Eighth
- Pronunciation: AhK-TEY-viy-Ah
- Variations: Octavian
- Namesakes: Claudia Octavia, a Roman empress who became the stepsister of the future Emperor Nero.
- Popularity: Octavia ranked 308th in the U.S. in 2025, near its best rank of 247th in 2022. Measured across the last 10 years of births against the 10 before them, it is the fastest riser on this list, up about 879 percent.
Orca
Orca meant cask in Latin, a barrel shape, which is how the killer whale eventually acquired the word. A second thread runs to orcus, the underworld, which gives the name a much darker edge. Quintus Orca governed the Roman province of Africa under Julius Caesar, so it did real work on land before it went to sea.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Whale
- Pronunciation: OHR-kaa
- Namesakes: Quintus Orca, a 1st-century governor of the Roman province of Africa and commanding officer under Julius Caesar.
- Popularity: Orca is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which lists only names given to five or more babies in a year.
Paulus
Paulus is the Latin original behind Paul, from parvus, meaning tiny, humble and modest. As a family name starting with P it reads as descendant of Paul. Italy shortened it to Paolo, English dropped everything after the L, and the full Latin ending survives mainly in church records. A small name that went everywhere.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Small
- Pronunciation: PAW-Lahs
- Variations: Paul
- Namesakes: Jeffrey Paulus, a Canadian head soccer coach of FC Edmonton in the Canadian Premier League. Stephen Paulus, an American composer, known for the 1982 opera The Postman Always Rings Twice.
- Popularity: Paulus last charted in the U.S. in 1987 at 7,826th, below the best rank of 3,824th it reached in 1965.
Pluto
Pluto is the Latin form of the Greek Plutos, meaning riches, and the god held wealth and the underworld in the same portfolio. There is also a Polish surname Pluto, from pluta, meaning bad weather, with no connection to the god at all. For most children now it is a planet or a cartoon dog first and a Roman deity a distant third.
- Origin: Latin, Polish
- Meaning: Wealth
- Pronunciation: PLOO-tow
- Popularity: Pluto ranked 7,552nd in the U.S. in 2025, its best rank so far, having first charted in 2022.
Pollux
Pollux began as the Greek Polydeukes, meaning very sweet, before Latin cut it short. He is the immortal half of the twins, brother to Castor and son of Zeus, and the pair were given the brightest stars in Gemini. A name that is half myth and half astronomy still reads as science fiction to most people.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Crown
- Pronunciation: PAAH-Lakhs
- Namesakes: Julius Pollux, a Greek-Egyptian scholar, who was made a professor-chair of rhetoric by Emperor Commodus.
- Popularity: Pollux ranked 13,410th in the U.S. in 2025, the rarest current rank on this list, at roughly one baby in every 333,333. Its best rank was 10,349th in 2015.
Pontius
Pontius has three possible roots and no settled answer: the Roman family name Potentinus, a word meaning fifth in one of the earliest Italian provincial languages, and the province of Pontus in Asia Minor, whose own name traces to the Greek pontos, meaning sea. One infamous prefect has kept it out of the running for two thousand years. It survives comfortably as a surname, which is the only place most people meet it.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Sea
- Pronunciation: PAHN-shus
- Variations: Pontus
- Namesakes: Chris Pontius, an American TV personality known for the reality comedy show Jackass. Mark Pontius, an American musician and a member of the band Foster the People.
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Pontius; the federal files start at five births in a year.
Procillius
Procillius probably started as Procillus, and it runs alongside Proculus, a diminutive of procus, meaning a suitor. The older use is the interesting one: it marked a child born while the father was away. A Roman historian of Cicero’s day carried the name, though his work survives only in other men’s quotations.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Suitor
- Pronunciation: Prow-CIHL-uhs
- Variations: Procillus, Proculus
- Namesakes: Procillius, a Roman historian in the time of Cicero, whose lost work is cited as a source by Roman scholars.
- Popularity: Procillius is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which publishes only names given to at least five babies in a year.
Quirinus
Quirinus reads as wielder of the spear, and it belonged to the Sabine war god the Romans absorbed into their own religion, sometimes titled the oak god. Hercules picked it up as a byname as well. It is a god’s name first and a family name a distant second.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Spear
- Pronunciation: Kue-REEN-uhs
- Namesakes: Publius Quirinius, a Roman aristocrat and governor of Syria around the time of Christ.
- Popularity: The Social Security Administration has no U.S. record for Quirinus; its files list only names reaching five births in a year.
Remus
Remus is the twin who lost, killed by his brother over the boundary of the city they were founding together. The name also carries the sense of oar and, in family use, descendant of Remus. It turns up as a surname in northern France, likely shortened from Remigius. Remi and Remy are the forms most parents actually choose now. Choosing Remus over Remy is a decision to keep the whole story.
- Origin: Latin, German
- Meaning: Oar
- Pronunciation: REE-muhs
- Variations: Remi, Remy, Remies, Remis
- Namesakes: Romola Remus, an American actress, first to play Dorothy in the film/stage adaptation of The Wizard of Oz in 1908. Robert Remus (known as Sgt. Slaughter), an American wrestler with the WWE.
- Popularity: Remus ranked 5,789th in the U.S. in 2025, well below its best rank of 1,701st in 1915.
Romulus
Romulus founded the city and then named it after himself, which is either confidence or circular logic. Legend dates the founding to 753 BCE, with Romulus taking the throne after his brother Remus died. The name means of Rome, or man of Rome, and it has never been separable from that story. It carries the weight of the whole founding myth, and it needs a family that wants the attention. Nothing about it is casual.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Of Rome
- Pronunciation: RAHM-yuh-Luhs
- Namesakes: Valerius Romulus, son of the emperor Maxentius and consul from 308 to 309 CE.
- Popularity: Romulus ranked 4,510th in the U.S. in 2025, below the best rank of 2,856th it held in 1970.
Rufus
Rufus is simply the Latin word for red, handed to men who were ruddy or red-haired, and England used it the same way for King William. Roman cognomina were often this plain, describing hair, height or the way a man walked. The name has aged into something warm and slightly bookish, and it needs no nickname. Ruffino stretches it out for Italian ears.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Red
- Pronunciation: RUW-Fahs
- Variations: Ruffus, Ruffino
- Namesakes: Alexis Rufus, an English Muay Thai kickboxer and a five-time world champion. Anneli Rufus, an American journalist for the Boston Globe.
- Popularity: Rufus ranked 4,019th in the U.S. in 2025, a long way from its best rank of 169th in 1913.
Rustica
Rustica comes from rusticus, meaning rural, and behind that rus, the open land. It named a country dweller, and in city mouths it could also mean simple or clownish. Roman snobbery about farming families is written straight into the vocabulary. As a name it is soft and unexpected, and it belonged to a line that produced a Stoic senator.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Rustic
- Pronunciation: ROOS-tik-Ah
- Namesakes: Quintus Rusticus, a 2nd-century Roman Senator and follower of Stoic philosophy.
- Popularity: Rustica sits below the five-birth line the U.S. name data uses, so no American ranking exists for it.
Salacia
Salacia was Neptune’s wife, the goddess who personified salt water, which makes her one of the few Roman deities whose name doubles as a chemistry lesson. It is rare in every form, as a surname and as a given name. For a family drawn to ocean names it is far less expected than Marina or Coral.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Salt
- Pronunciation: Sah-LAA-shah
- Variations: Salicia
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Salacia. Federal data begins at five births in a year, and the name has never reached it.
Saturn
Saturn was the god of sowing and of the wealth that came out of the ground, and Jupiter’s father in the Roman line of gods. The planet carries his name, which is where nearly everyone meets the word first. As a surname it is close to unused, though it has started to appear on American birth certificates in small numbers.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: God of sowing
- Pronunciation: SAAH-Terne
- Popularity: Saturn ranked 6,514th in the U.S. in 2025, near its best rank of 6,380th in 2021, and it first charted in 1996.
Scipione
Scipione is the Italian stretch of the Latin Scipio, from scipionis, meaning staff or scepter. It belonged to the Cornelii, one of Rome’s great patrician families, and it is best known in that shorter form. A name that started as a walking stick and ended as a symbol of command is very Roman indeed.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Stick
- Pronunciation: Ski-pee-OWN-ey
- Variations: Scippa, Scippo, Scippari, Scippare, Scippione
- Namesakes: Francesco Scipione, an 18th-century Venetian writer on Etruscan antiquities. Andrew Scipione, an Australian police officer who worked with the National Crime Authority of Australia in 1985.
- Popularity: Scipione has never met the five-birth threshold the U.S. data requires, so it goes unranked here.
Seneca
Seneca traces to the Latin senectus, meaning old, which was a compliment in a culture that equated age with authority. Two Senecas, father and son, wrote their way into permanence, the younger as a Stoic philosopher. The name has an entirely separate life in North America, where it belongs to the Seneca nation and reads as people of the standing rock. That double history is worth knowing before you use it. Isaac Seneca, the first American Indian selected as an All-American football player, carried it into the modern era.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: People of the standing rock
- Pronunciation: SEH-nek-Ah
- Namesakes: Seneca the Younger, an ancient Roman Stoic philosopher. Isaac Seneca, a Native American football player, and the first American Indian selected as an All-American player.
- Popularity: Seneca ranked 4,343rd in the U.S. in 2025, below the best rank of 2,059th it reached in 1980.
Severna
Severna is the feminine of Severus, so the plain reading is severe or stern. Slavic languages give it a separate sense, northern, which softens it considerably. Severin is the form that survived best in Europe. It is a name with a straight back and no small talk.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Severe
- Pronunciation: Seh-VERN-ah
- Variations: Severnus, Severin
- Popularity: Severna is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which lists only names given to five or more babies in a year.
Sextus
Sextus means sixth and was one of the standard Roman first names, used by aristocratic and working families alike. It ranked tenth in frequency among Roman praenomina, and families handed it to a sixth child. The feminine forms Sexta and Sextilia followed the same counting logic. English speakers will hear something the Romans did not, which is the obstacle now.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Sixth
- Pronunciation: SEHKS-tuhs
- Variations: Sextia, Sextilia, Sexta
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Sextus; the federal files start at five births in a year.
Soranus
Soranus marked a person from Sora, in what is now Lazio, and it also belonged to a local god the Romans folded into their own religion as Apollo Soranus. His worshippers were known as the wolves of Soranus, which is the detail that makes the name stick. Soranus of Ephesus, a physician of the Methodic school, is the best documented bearer.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: From Sora
- Pronunciation: Soh-RAAHN-uhs
- Namesakes: Soranus of Ephesus, a Greek physician of the Methodic school of medicine.
- Popularity: Soranus has never met the five-birth threshold the U.S. name data requires.
Strabo
Strabo means squinter, another Roman nickname built from a physical trait, and it attached itself to a branch of the Julii. The word survives in medicine as strabismus, the term for misaligned eyes. The geographer Strabo, writing in the age of Tiberius, is the reason anyone reads the name at all today.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Squinter
- Pronunciation: STRAAH-Bow
- Namesakes: Strabo, an ancient Greek geographer whose book Geography was written in the time of the Roman emperor Tiberius.
- Popularity: Strabo sits below the publication line for U.S. birth data, so it carries no American rank.
Tatius
Tatius comes from Titius and carries the same sense of honorable. Titus Tatius ruled the Sabines and then shared the throne of Rome with Romulus, an arrangement that lasted about as long as you would expect. Of the three related forms it is the rarest, and Titus is the one families actually use.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Honorable
- Pronunciation: TAY-shuhs
- Variations: Titus
- Namesakes: Titus Tatius, the king of the Sabines and joint-ruler of the Kingdom of Rome.
- Popularity: Tatius is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which publishes only names given to at least five babies in a year.
Tiberius
Tiberius belongs to the river running through Rome, so the sense is of the Tiber, or lord of it. It was a working first name in aristocratic families long before the second emperor made it imperial. Science fiction has kept it alive as a middle name, which is where most parents meet it now. Ty is the practical short form.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Of the Tiber
- Pronunciation: Taiy-BEER-ee-Uhs
- Namesakes: Tiberius Augustus, the second Roman emperor from 14 CE until 37 CE.
- Popularity: Tiberius ranked 3,177th in the U.S. in 2025, below the best rank of 1,522nd it reached in 2015, and it first charted in 1992.
Titus
Titus has been linked to the Latin Titan, the giant, and Romans used it as a title of honor for men in command. It was among the most common first names in the republic, and it survived the empire intact through scripture and the stage. Short, hard and finished in two syllables, it needs nothing added to it. It is one of the handful here still inside the top 400, at 358th in 2025. Titas is the listed variation if you want a small twist on it.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Title of honor
- Pronunciation: TAEY-Tahs
- Variations: Titas
- Namesakes: Christopher Titus, an American comedian known for his Fox TV series Titus. Alice Titus, a U.S. congressional representative for Nevada since 2013.
- Popularity: Titus ranked 358th in the U.S. in 2025, close to its best rank of 280th in 2015, and it is one of the five names on the chart above.
Tucca
Tucca is the feminine of Tuccio, part of a small family of names centered in Calabria. It has an odd second life in zoology, where Tuccidae names a family of parasitic arthropods. No agreed meaning has come down with it. Rare, blunt and slightly comic to an English ear.
- Origin: Latin, Italian
- Meaning: Unknown
- Pronunciation: TOO-Kah
- Variations: Tuccio, Tucci
- Popularity: The Social Security Administration has no U.S. record for Tucca; its files list only names reaching five births in a year.
Ursus
Ursus is the Latin word for bear, and almost nothing else about it is settled. Saint Ursus, a soldier and martyr of the third century, gave it a devotional history, and Switzerland still uses the short form Urs for boys. Ursa keeps the feminine line, and the constellation keeps the bear.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Bear
- Pronunciation: EHR-suss
- Variations: Ursa
- Namesakes: Nicolaus Baer (known as Reimarus Ursus), a 16th-century German astronomer and imperial mathematician to Emperor Rudolf II. Ambrose Bierce (pen name Ursus), an American writer best known for “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.”
- Popularity: Ursus sits below the five-birth line the U.S. name data uses, so no American ranking exists for it.
Valentinus
Valentinus is the V surname behind Valentine, built on valens, meaning healthy or strong. The path from a Roman cognomen to a February card is long, though the name itself barely changed along the way. It has never cleared five U.S. births in a year, a name that has stayed entirely on paper.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Strong
- Pronunciation: Vaa-len-TEEN-uhs
- Variations: Valentinian
- Namesakes: Basilius Valentinus, a 15th-century German alchemist and Canon of the Benedictine Priory of Saint Peter.
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Valentinus. Federal data begins at five births in a year, and the name has never reached it.
Valor
Valor reads as bravery and, in its Latin sense, worthiness, a quality Roman writers ranked above nearly everything else. The Greek side of this entry belongs to Ares, one of the Twelve Olympians and the son of Zeus and Hera, the god the ancients associated with valor. It is a virtue name rather than a family name, which is exactly why it sounds contemporary.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Bravery
- Pronunciation: VAH-lure
- Popularity: Valor ranked 1,254th in the U.S. in 2025, its best rank since it first appeared in the data in 1988.
Vatia
Vatia means bent outwards, which in practice meant bow-legged. A member of the Servilii carried it first, and the family kept it as their branch marker. Roman naming did not flatter, and this is one of the plainest examples on the list.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Bow-legged
- Pronunciation: VAH-tiy-Ah
- Popularity: Vatia has never met the five-birth threshold the U.S. data requires, so it goes unranked here.
Vesta
Vesta was the goddess of the hearth, the fire at the center of the Roman home, and the Greeks knew her as Hestia. The name also worked as a surname around Velletri, a town near Rome. Her priestesses are the reason the word still carries the sense of pure. It is warm, brief and almost entirely unused now, which makes it quietly available. Vestra and Vestri travel with it as variants.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Pure
- Pronunciation: VES-tahh
- Variations: Vestry, Vestra, Vestri
- Popularity: Vesta last charted in the U.S. in 2024 at 17,537th, a long way from its best rank of 408th in 1918.
Vita
Vita comes through Vitalis from vivus, the Latin for alive. Romans used Vitalis in a strikingly practical way, to tell the living member of a family apart from the dead one who shared his name. It is short, clean and easy to say in most languages, which is rare for a name this old.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Life
- Pronunciation: VEE-tah
- Variations: VIto
- Namesakes: Alessio Vita, an Italian footballer for Cittadella. Lucas Vita, a Brazilian water polo player with the silver medalist men’s national water polo team at the 2007 Pan American Games.
- Popularity: Vita ranked 4,454th in the U.S. in 2025, below its best rank of 796th in 1929. Its use bottomed out in 1988 and has since recovered about fivefold, the biggest revival on this list.
Volesus
Volesus comes from the Latin volo, meaning to wish or intend, so the sense lands somewhere near well-wisher. It ran in the Valerii, sometimes in the form Volero, and the family traced itself back to a Volesus who came to Rome with the Sabine king Titus Tatius. It disappeared as a surname long ago and never came back.
- Origin: Latin
- Meaning: Well-wishers
- Pronunciation: Voh-LEE-suhs
- Variations: Valesus
- Namesakes: Volesus Valerius, an ancient ancestor of the Valerian Roman clan who came to Rome with Titus Tatius, king of the Sabines.
- Popularity: Volesus is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which lists only names given to five or more babies in a year.
Volpi
Volpi comes from volpe, the fox, and Italian records read it two ways: a person who lived at the sign of the fox, or a person who behaved like one. Cunning was not an insult in a merchant city. It is one of the more usable names on this list, short and easy on English ears.
- Origin: Latin, Italian
- Meaning: Fox
- Pronunciation: VOHL-pee
- Variations: Volpe
- Namesakes: Jorge Volpi, a Mexican novelist known for In Search of Klingsor. Grazia Volpi, one of the first female film producers in Italy.
- Popularity: No U.S. ranking exists for Volpi; the federal files start at five births in a year.
Vulcan
Vulcan comes from the Latin surname Vulcanus, the god of fire in its volcanic form and the patron of metalwork. Romania kept it as a family name, carried by a bishop and by the editor who founded the literary magazine Familia. Science fiction later borrowed it for a species, which is the association most readers reach first now.
- Origin: Latin, Romanian
- Meaning: God of fire
- Pronunciation: VUHL-kahn
- Variations: Vulcanus
- Namesakes: Samuil Vulcan, the Bishop of the Diocese of Oradea Mare of the Romanian Greek Catholic Church from 1806 to 1839. Iosif Vulcan, a Romanian editor who founded the literary magazine Familia.
- Popularity: Vulcan has never met the five-birth threshold the U.S. name data requires.
Wilhelmus
Wilhelmus is the Latin dress worn by the German Willahalm, built from wil, meaning desire, and helm, meaning protection. It moved into Germany with the migrating tribes and settled in as a noble name through the medieval period. Wilhelm is the everyday form, and William is what English made of it.
- Origin: Latin, German
- Meaning: Strong helmet
- Pronunciation: Will-HELM-uhs
- Variations: Wilhelm, Wilhelms
- Popularity: Wilhelmus sits below the publication line for U.S. birth data, so it carries no American rank.
Xanthus
Xanthus is the Latin form of the Greek Xanthos, meaning yellow or fair, and it began as a nickname for a blond man. Myth gives the name to the river of Troy, called Scamander by mortals and Xanthus by the gods. It belongs to the small group of Roman names taken from gods who stand for one piece of the natural world.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Golden
- Pronunciation: ZAHN-Thas
- Variations: Xanthos
- Popularity: Xanthus last charted in the U.S. in 2013 at 13,979th, below the best rank of 11,300th it set in 2004.
Zephyrinus
Zephyrinus comes from the Greek Zephyros, the west wind, and the god who carried it. A pope of the early third century wore the name, which is how a Greek weather word ended up in Latin church records. Zeferino and Zeferina are the Iberian forms, and Zephyr is what a modern family would actually use. It closes this list on the lightest possible note.
- Origin: Latin, Greek
- Meaning: Wind, breeze
- Pronunciation: Zeff-uh-REE-nuhs
- Variations: Zephyrin, Zephryine, Zeferino, Zeferina
- Namesakes: Pope Zephyrinus, the bishop of Rome from 199 to 217 CE.
- Popularity: Zephyrinus is too rare for the U.S. federal name data, which publishes only names given to at least five babies in a year.
