Isidor
Greek masculine name meaning "gift of the goddess Isis".
Name Census estimates that about 73 living Americans carry the first name Isidor. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Isidor today is around 52 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Isidor births was 1914 (24 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Isidor. 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 Isidor. It is among the rarest names in the SSA records.
People living today
73
~ 1 in 4,695,265 Americans
Peak year
1914
24 babies that year
Average age
52
years old
2024 SSA rank
#9,316
Tracked since 1883
Popularity
Isidor: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Isidor from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 11 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1910s, with 160 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1910s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Isidor 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 Isidor during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Isidors live
Origin
Meaning and history of Isidor
The name Isidor has its origins in the Greek language, derived from the words "isos" meaning "equal" and "doron" meaning "gift." It can be interpreted as "equal gift" or "gift of equality." The name gained prominence during the Byzantine era, which spanned from the 4th to the 15th centuries.
One of the earliest recorded references to the name Isidor can be found in the writings of Isidore of Seville, a scholar and prominent figure in the Catholic Church who lived from around 560 to 636 AD. He was known for his extensive literary works, including the encyclopedic "Etymologiae," which covered a wide range of subjects.
Isidor has been a popular name throughout history, with several notable individuals bearing this name. One example is Saint Isidore the Farmer, a Spanish farmer and laborer who lived in the 12th century and is venerated as the patron saint of farmers in the Catholic Church. Another notable figure is Isidore of Miletus, a renowned Greek mathematician and architect from the 6th century, known for his contributions to the construction of the Hagia Sophia basilica in Constantinople.
In the 17th century, Isidor Dioscoredes was a Greek monk and calligrapher who lived from 1629 to 1701. He is renowned for his exceptional calligraphic works and is considered one of the most skilled calligraphers in Greek history.
Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, a French naturalist and zoologist who lived from 1805 to 1861, made significant contributions to the field of teratology, the study of abnormal development in organisms.
More recently, Isidor Isaac Rabi was an American physicist and Nobel laureate, born in 1898 and lived until 1988. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1944 for his groundbreaking work on magnetic resonance, which laid the foundation for the development of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technology.
These are just a few examples of the many notable individuals throughout history who have borne the name Isidor, reflecting its rich cultural and historical significance across various disciplines and time periods.
People
Isidor + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Isidor as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with I
Other first names starting with I with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Isidor: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Isidor?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 73 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Isidor 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 4,695,265 US residents.
Is Isidor a common name?
We classify Isidor as "Very Rare". It ranks above 60% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 411 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Isidor most popular?
The single biggest year for Isidor was 1914, when 24 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Isidor is about 52 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
Is Isidor a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Isidor in the SSA data are male. 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.