Barnaby

What Barnaby means

Means “prophet’s son”

English surname of Aramaic origin, from בַּר נְבִיָּא (bar nəḇiyyā, literally “prophet’s son”).

Source: Wiktionary, “Barnaby” (revision 93950625), CC BY-SA 4.0. Quoted from the etymology; we don’t write our own.

How popular is Barnaby?

US: New in the last 10 years. England & Wales: Rising: up from #207 in 2015.

Biggest US share so far: 1974, when 19 boys got the name (#2199 that year). First in the US records in 1953.

How common

• About 1 in 341,615 baby boys in the US in 2025
• About 1 in 996 baby boys in England and Wales in 2025
• About 1 in 4,910 baby boys in Scotland in 2025

“1 in N” divides by all listed births for that sex. The US list leaves out names given to fewer than 5 babies, and the UK lists leave out names given to 2 or fewer, so the real figure is a little rarer than shown.

US vs UK

Barnaby is #12008 in the US and #185 in England & Wales (2025).

Same sex as this page (boys). SSA (US), ONS (England and Wales), NRS (Scotland).

Boy or girl?

In 2025, 99.9+% of US babies named Barnaby were boys.

Counts below the publishing threshold (US 5, UK 3) are not included.

If you like Barnaby

Boys

• Amos#730“to carry; a burden”^*
• Raphael#394“God cures/has healed”^*
• Elliott#160“my God is Yahweh”^*
• Ira#819“watchful”^*
• Elliot#151Variant of Elliott, meaning “my God is Yahweh”^*
• Jedidiah#874“beloved of Yahweh”^*

For a sister

• Davina#749Feminine form of David, meaning “beloved”^*
• Ariella#174Form of Ariel, meaning “lion of God”^*
• Ruth#173Editor’s note Peaked in the US in 1920, with 26,102 babies; 1,781 in 2025
• Elsie#123Diminutive of Alison, meaning “of noble kind”^*
• Arielle#485Variant of Ariel, meaning “lion of God”^*
• Lena#279“the Large River”^*

Picked from the US top 1,000 in 2025: names Wiktionary also files under Hebrew, whose US popularity since 1990 rose and fell most like Barnaby’s. Rank is US 2025.