Animal Names for Boys

This old-school Nordic name derives from the Old Norse word jarl, meaning "leader, chief".

Brace yourself? You're going to hear that one a lot if you choose this word name for your baby son, as a handful of parents in the US did in a recent year. One reason for this word is being used as a name: It rhymes with the popular Jace.

Gorm the Old was a famed king of Denmark. His name was common in Viking times.

Surname name Grayson has become quite popular in recent years, bringing with it Gray, Grey, Greyson, and, yes, Graysen.

Actress America Ferrera, of Ugly Betty fame, has pretty much feminized this name in the US.

This surname name fits in with current favorites like Hudson, but is much less common as a given name. It's widely familiar thanks to the late Jim Henson, creator of The Muppets.

Gediminas is derived from the Lithuanian elements gedauti, meaning "grieve," and minėti, "to celebrate" or "to mention." The most famous bearer of the name is Gediminas, Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1316–1341. Many consider him the true founder of Lithuania, and baby boys are often named in his honor.

One of the more unfamiliar Nordic choices, a perfect set-up for the nickname Brody.

Few Scandinavian names make the journey to America...and this one shows you why. Still, names such as Freya and Odin are making an unlikely comeback, so we wouldn't count any of the Scandinavian baby names out forever.

Aydan has been a popular alternate spellings of Aidan, though it has been declining in usage since 2008. It has also been seen as a girl's name.

Goodwin — which is mostly seen as a last name — comes from the long-forgotten given name Godwine. Godwine was a relatively common name in medieval England. It later traveled to Germanic regions in the form of Godwin.

This version of the name changes the nickname from Eli to Ali.

This tree name could be one of those fresh, cool nature names for winter babies, though we can only imagine the kind of jokes that will fly in junior high.

Russian form of Eugene, also spelled Evgeni or Evgeniy in English, and the (anti)hero of Pushkin's famous eponymous novel in verse, Evgeny Onegin.

This Welsh surname might be an interesting alternative to the popular Evan, though that Bev beginning conjures up a fifty-five-year-old woman named Beverly.

In The Lord of the Rings, Eärendil is a half-Elven seafarer whose ship turns into a star. J.R.R. Tolkien based his name off of the Anglo-Saxon Ēarendel, a variation of Aurvandill, a Germanic mythological character.