FOR THE EIGHTH year in a row, Jack is the most popular name for baby boys in Ireland. Emily also continues to extend her dominance among baby girls, taking the number one spot for the fourth consecutive year.
To enforce how we really are a predictable bunch, the top five boys names have been the same since 2007. Jack, James, Daniel, Conor and Sean have all featured in various arrangements, with Jack ruling each year, naturally.
We’re obviously into our vowels when naming baby girls, with the 2013 top five being made up of Emily, Emma, Sophie, Ella and Amelia.
Emily, the most popular girls’ name, has been in the top five in five of the last six years. Emma has been in the top four most popular names since 2007 while Amelia has climbed steadily in popularity each year.
There were 764 Jacks born last last year out of 35,272 baby boys. That’s about one Jack for every 46 baby boys born last year, or a ‘Jack-rate’ of 2.2 per cent.
Similarly, there were 625 new Emilys last year out of 33,658 that were born. About one Emily for every 53 baby girls.
But there have been some new entries into the top 100 chart for both boys and girls.
For the lads, they both begin with ‘K’. The highest new entry at number 85 was Kai rising from 103rd place in 2012. The name rising most in popularity in the year was Kayden which has shot up 44 places to 89th
On the the girls side of things the pull of celebrity babies also seems to be irresistible, with Sadie shooting up a massive 62 places in the female baby chart to 77th place. But even that impressive performance can’t compare with the irresistible rise of Fiadh, which is up 64 places to 82nd.
Other new entries into the baby girl Hot 100 were Sienna and Poppy.
1963
Fifty years ago last year was the year one of the most famous ever Jacks died. JFK might have been affectionately referred to as Jack, but even his given name John was Ireland’s number one boys baby name.
Perhaps not surprisingly, John and Mary were the most popular babies’ names registered in 1963. That year, we had 3,892 new Johns and 3,721 new Marys
The top five boys’ names in 1963 were John, Patrick, Michael, Paul and James. Of these five, only James is hanging on in there in the top five.
For girls, we had a rather regal top five of Mary, Margaret, Catherine, Ann and Anne. None of these featured in the top five last year and none of the top 1o from 1963 are still there either. Poor girls.
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