Gyllian
A feminine given name of Welsh origin meaning "a woman from Brittany".
Name Census estimates that about 28 living Americans carry the first name Gyllian. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Gyllian today is around 24 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Gyllian births was 2001 (7 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Gyllian. 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.
Key insights
- • Fewer than 100 living Americans are believed to carry the name Gyllian. It is among the rarest names in the SSA records.
People living today
28
~ 1 in 12,241,226 Americans
Peak year
2001
7 babies that year
Average age
24
years old
2010 SSA rank
#17,957
Tracked since 1997
Popularity
Gyllian: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Gyllian from the 1990s through to the 2010s, spanning 3 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 19 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 2000s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Gyllian 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 Gyllian during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Origin
Meaning and history of Gyllian
The name Gyllian is a variant spelling of the Welsh name Gillian, which is derived from the French name Juliane. Juliane is the French form of the Latin name Iuliana, which was the feminine form of the Roman family name Iulianus, which was derived from the name of the Roman gens (clan) Julia.
The name Gillian can be traced back to the 6th century, when it was first recorded in the writings of the Venerable Bede, an English monk and scholar. It is thought to have been introduced to Britain by the Normans after the Norman Conquest of England in 1066.
One of the earliest recorded bearers of the name Gillian was Gillian de Lacy, a 12th-century Norman noblewoman who was the wife of Walter de Lacy, Lord of Meath. Another notable early bearer of the name was Gillian de Vaux, a 13th-century English noblewoman who was the wife of Roger de Quincy, Earl of Winchester.
In the Middle Ages, the name Gillian was also used as a masculine name, and there are several examples of men bearing the name. One of the most notable was Gillian de Badelesmere, a 14th-century English nobleman who was a prominent military commander during the Wars of Scottish Independence.
Other famous bearers of the name Gyllian or Gillian throughout history include:
1. Gillian Somerville (c. 1102-1168), a Scottish noblewoman and the mother of King William the Lion of Scotland.
2. Gillian of Burnham (fl. 1290), an English anchoress and mystic.
3. Gillian de Burgh (c. 1319-1361), an Anglo-Irish noblewoman who was the wife of John de Burgh, Earl of Ulster.
4. Gillian Douglas (c. 1425-1499), a Scottish noblewoman and the mother of King James IV of Scotland.
5. Gillian Cooke (1490-1554), an English Protestant martyr who was burned at the stake during the Marian Persecutions.
People
Gyllian + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Gyllian 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
Gyllian: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Gyllian?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 28 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Gyllian 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 12,241,226 US residents.
Is Gyllian a common name?
We classify Gyllian as "Very Rare". It ranks above 45.4% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 29 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Gyllian most popular?
The single biggest year for Gyllian was 2001, when 7 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Gyllian is about 24 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Gyllian in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Gyllian a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Gyllian 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.
Is Gyllian still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Gyllian in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Gyllian can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
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.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only covers names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files do not have a published Census demographic snapshot. In those cases, the page still shows the SSA trend, gender history, and state data.
How many people share the name Gyllian?
HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, answers that with the living-bearer count in one glance.