Jacobus
A masculine name of Hebrew origin meaning "supplanter" or "one who grasps the heel".
Name Census estimates that about 134 living Americans carry the first name Jacobus. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Jacobus today is around 23 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Jacobus births was 1997 (8 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Jacobus. 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.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Jacobus with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
134
~ 1 in 2,557,868 Americans
Peak year
1997
8 babies that year
Average age
23
years old
2024 SSA rank
#11,444
Tracked since 1979
Census
Jacobus in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 638 people with the first name Jacobus, which placed it at #17,339 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#17,339
National first-name rank
People counted
638
638 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
65.5% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Jacobus
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Jacobus is White at 65.5%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (28.4%) and Black (2.8%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Jacobus described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Jacobus at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White65.5% · 418
- Two or more races28.4% · 181
- Black or African American2.8% · 18
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.6% · 10
- Hispanic or Latino1.4% · 9
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.3% · 2
Popularity
Jacobus: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Jacobus from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 47 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2000s peak, Jacobus remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Jacobus 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 Jacobus 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 Jacobus
The given name Jacobus has its origins in the Hebrew language, deriving from the name Ya'aqov, meaning "supplanter" or "one who follows". It is the Latin form of the name Jacob, which is found in the Old Testament of the Bible. The name gained widespread usage during the Roman era, as many early Christians adopted the Latin versions of biblical names.
Jacobus is closely related to the names Jacob, James, and their various linguistic derivations across different cultures and languages. In ancient times, the name was particularly popular among Jewish and early Christian communities, as it held significant religious and cultural significance.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Jacobus can be found in the New Testament, where it refers to James, the son of Zebedee and one of the twelve apostles of Jesus Christ. Another notable figure from the Bible bearing this name is James, the brother of Jesus, who is often referred to as James the Just.
Throughout history, several notable individuals have borne the name Jacobus. One of the most prominent was Jacobus de Voragine (c. 1230-1298), an Italian chronicler and archbishop of Genoa, best known for his work Legenda Aurea, a collection of saints' lives that greatly influenced medieval hagiography.
Another notable bearer of the name was Jacobus Arminius (1560-1609), a Dutch theologian and pastor who founded the Remonstrant movement within Calvinism, which later became known as Arminianism. His teachings challenged the doctrine of predestination and emphasized free will.
In the field of mathematics, Jacobus Bernoulli (1654-1705) was a Swiss mathematician and scientist who made significant contributions to the development of calculus and probability theory. He is also known for the Bernoulli numbers and the Bernoulli form of the Euler-Maclaurin formula.
Another notable figure was Jacobus Houbraken (1698-1780), a Dutch engraver and writer who is best known for his biographical work "The Great Theatre of Dutch Painters and Draughtsmen" (De Groote Schouburgh der Nederlantsche Konstschilders en Schilderessen), which provided valuable information about Dutch artists from the 16th and 17th centuries.
Lastly, Jacobus Fridericus Fries (1773-1843) was a German philosopher and Protestant theologian who made significant contributions to the field of epistemology. He is known for his theory of "anthropological knowledge," which emphasized the subjective nature of human perception and experience.
People
Jacobus + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Jacobus as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with J
Other first names starting with J with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Jacobus: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Jacobus?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 134 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Jacobus 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 2,557,868 US residents.
Is Jacobus a common name?
We classify Jacobus as "Very Rare". It ranks above 68.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 137 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Jacobus most popular?
The single biggest year for Jacobus was 1997, when 8 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Jacobus is about 23 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Jacobus in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 638 people with the name Jacobus, or 0.21 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #17,339 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Jacobus in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Jacobus?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Jacobus appears almost entirely male. Of the 629 people counted with this name, 100.0% were male and only a very small share were female. The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Jacobus?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Jacobus is White at 65.5%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (28.4%) and Black (2.8%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Jacobus most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Jacobus in the 2020 Census, accounting for 65.5% (418 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
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 Jacobus in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Jacobus a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Jacobus 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.
Is Jacobus still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Jacobus 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 Jacobus 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.
How many people are named Jacobus?
Our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers how many Americans are named Jacobus at a glance, with the living-bearer count up front.