Mataio
A masculine name of Polynesian origin meaning "gift from God".
Name Census estimates that about 113 living Americans carry the first name Mataio. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Mataio today is around 15 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Mataio births was 2013 (17 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Mataio. 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 Mataio with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
113
~ 1 in 3,033,224 Americans
Peak year
2013
17 babies that year
Average age
15
years old
2024 SSA rank
#8,707
Tracked since 1998
Popularity
Mataio: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Mataio from the 1990s through to the 2020s, spanning 4 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 52 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Mataio remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Mataio 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 Mataio during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Mataios live
Origin
Meaning and history of Mataio
The given name Mataio has its origins in the Hebrew language and culture, dating back to ancient times. It is a variant of the name Mattathias, which is derived from the Hebrew word "Mattityahu," meaning "gift of God."
In the Bible, Mattathias was a Jewish priest who led the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucid Empire in the 2nd century BC. The name gained significance among early Christians, as it was also the original Hebrew name of the apostle Matthew, one of the four Evangelists in the New Testament.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Mataio can be found in the writings of the Church Fathers, who often referred to the apostle Matthew by this variant spelling. St. Jerome, a prominent 4th-century scholar and translator of the Bible, used the name Mataio in his Latin translation of the Gospels.
Throughout history, several notable individuals have borne the name Mataio. One of the earliest was Mataio Vegio (1407-1458), an Italian humanist and poet from Lodi, known for his work "Philalethes" and other Latin poems.
In the 16th century, Mataio Dario (1516-1583) was a prominent Italian jurist and legal scholar from Perugia, who authored several influential works on Roman law.
During the Renaissance, Mataio Zuccari (1542-1595) was an Italian painter and architect from the Zuccari family of artists, known for his frescoes in the Vatican and other churches in Rome.
In the 19th century, Mataio Preti (1805-1877) was an Italian painter and engraver from Calabria, known for his religious works and portraits.
Another notable figure was Mataio Saba (1844-1920), an Italian mathematician and astronomer from Sardinia, who made significant contributions to the study of celestial mechanics and the theory of elliptic functions.
People
Mataio + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Mataio as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with M
Other first names starting with M with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Mataio: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Mataio?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 113 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Mataio 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 3,033,224 US residents.
Is Mataio a common name?
We classify Mataio as "Very Rare". It ranks above 66.3% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 114 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Mataio most popular?
The single biggest year for Mataio was 2013, when 17 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Mataio is about 15 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 Mataio in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Mataio a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Mataio 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 Mataio still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Mataio 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 Mataio 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 have Mataio as a first name?
If you just want to know how many people have the name Mataio, HowManyOfMe.org gives you the headline number in one glance.