Sigmund
A masculine name of Germanic origin meaning "victorious protection".
Name Census estimates that about 730 living Americans carry the first name Sigmund. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Sigmund today is around 57 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Sigmund births was 1918 (151 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Sigmund. 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
730
~ 1 in 469,526 Americans
Peak year
1918
151 babies that year
Average age
57
years old
2024 SSA rank
#7,640
Tracked since 1886
Popularity
Sigmund: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Sigmund from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1910s, with 1,044 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
Sigmund 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 Sigmund during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Sigmunds live
The SSA's state-level files cover 12 states and territories. New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey recorded the most babies named Sigmund, while Minnesota, Indiana, Maryland recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 119 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Sigmund
The name Sigmund is of Germanic origin, derived from the Old Norse words "sigr" meaning victory and "mundr" meaning protection or hand. It was a popular name during the Viking era and Middle Ages in Scandinavia and parts of northern Europe.
The earliest recorded instances of the name Sigmund can be traced back to the Old Norse sagas and Icelandic literature, particularly the Völsunga saga, where Sigmund is a legendary hero and dragon-slayer. In the Nibelungenlied, a medieval German epic poem, Sigmund is the father of the hero Siegfried.
One of the earliest known historical figures with the name Sigmund was Sigmund I, also known as Sigmund the Stout, who was the King of Sweden from 1125 to 1130. Another notable figure was Sigmund Ferabach, an Austrian knight who lived in the 15th century and was known for his military exploits during the Hussite Wars.
In the 16th century, Sigmund I, also known as Sigismund the Old, was the King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1506 to 1548. He played a significant role in the Polish-Lithuanian Union and the reformation of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.
The name gained further prominence in the 19th century with the renowned psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, who was born in 1856 in Moravia (now part of the Czech Republic) and died in 1939 in London. Freud's groundbreaking work on the unconscious mind and psychoanalysis had a profound impact on psychology and modern culture.
Another notable figure from the 19th century was Sigmund Romberg, an American composer of Hungarian descent, who was born in 1887 and died in 1951. He is best known for his operettas, including "The Student Prince" and "The Desert Song."
In the 20th century, Sigmund Jähn was the first German citizen to travel to space as part of the Soviet-East German Interkosmos program in 1978. He was born in 1937 and is still alive today.
People
Sigmund + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Sigmund as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with S
Other first names starting with S with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Sigmund: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Sigmund?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 730 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Sigmund 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 469,526 US residents.
Is Sigmund a common name?
We classify Sigmund as "Very Rare". It ranks above 87.9% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 2,848 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Sigmund most popular?
The single biggest year for Sigmund was 1918, when 151 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Sigmund is about 57 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
Is Sigmund a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Sigmund 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.