Gari
A name of African origin meaning "courage."
Name Census estimates that about 497 living Americans carry the first name Gari. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 75.4% of registrations being female. The average person named Gari today is around 60 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Gari births was 1963 (31 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Gari. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
People living today
497
~ 1 in 689,647 Americans
Peak year
1963
31 babies that year
Average age
60
years old
1993 SSA rank
#9,212
Tracked since 1938
Gender
Gender distribution for Gari
Gari is one of the more evenly split names in the SSA data. Of the 643 total registrations, 158 (24.6%) were male and 485 (75.4%) were female.
Gari as a male name
- Ranked #9,212 in 1993
- 5 male births in 1993
- Peak: 1963 (13 births)
Gari as a female name
- Ranked #18,561 in 2007
- 5 female births in 2007
- Peak: 1967 (24 births)
Popularity
Gari: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Gari from the 1930s through to the 2000s, spanning 8 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1960s, with 203 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1960s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Gari by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Gari during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Garis live
Origin
Meaning and history of Gari
The name Gari is a diminutive form of the name Garialdo, which is derived from the Germanic elements "gairu" meaning "spear" and "waldan" meaning "to rule or govern". The name has its origins in medieval Germanic cultures, particularly among the Franks and Lombards in the 6th to 8th centuries AD.
Gari was a relatively common name among the Frankish nobility during the Merovingian and Carolingian dynasties. One of the earliest recorded instances of the name can be found in the "Annales Regni Francorum" (Annals of the Frankish Kingdom), where a Frankish nobleman named Gari is mentioned as a participant in the Battle of Poitiers in 732 AD.
In the 9th century, a Frankish monk named Gari of St. Gall (c. 810 - 870) gained prominence as a scholar, poet, and teacher at the Abbey of St. Gall in modern-day Switzerland. He is known for his works on grammar, poetry, and hagiography.
Another notable figure with the name Gari was Gari of Anjou (c. 995 - 1040), a French nobleman who served as the Count of Anjou from 1036 to 1040. He played a significant role in the conflicts between the House of Anjou and the House of Blois during the early 11th century.
In the 12th century, Gari of Fontaines (c. 1150 - 1225) was a French theologian and philosopher who taught at the University of Paris. He is known for his works on logic and metaphysics, and his contributions to the development of scholastic philosophy.
During the Renaissance period, Gari Ferri (c. 1490 - 1548) was an Italian painter and architect from the city of Faenza. He is remembered for his fresco works in various churches and palaces in Emilia-Romagna, Italy.
People
Gari + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Gari as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with G
Other first names starting with G with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Gari: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Gari?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 497 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Gari going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 689,647 US residents.
Is Gari a common name?
We classify Gari as "Very Rare". It ranks above 84.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 643 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Gari most popular?
The single biggest year for Gari was 1963, when 31 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Gari is about 60 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
Is Gari a female name?
Yes, 75.4% of people registered as Gari in the SSA data are female. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.