9 Letter Boy Names

No longer a one-person name, as a number of parents have been inspired by basketball great Shaquille O'Neal to adopt it for their own future athletes.

Nathaniel is a wonderful classic name and Nathanael, which may be an ancient Greek or Hebrew form, is appealing and has gravitas but may prove needlessly confusing in the modern world.

One of several more venerable names that get to the nickname Zack if you're tired of Zachary. In the New Testament, Zacharias was the husband of Elizabeth and father of John the Baptist.

Sovereign is a new addition to the baby name lexicon, recently used by such celebrity parents as Cam Newton and Usher for their daughters. But don't mistake it for an exclusively feminine name — part of Sovereign's appeal is its gender-neutral status, as it's given to roughly equal numbers of girls and boys each yera.

An everyday name in France, a charismatic possibility here.

Also spelled Sigfrid, this hefty German name has an appropriately majestic meaning: "victorious peace". Fittingly, a famous bearer was the English World War I poet and pacifist Siegfried Sassoon. Sassoon was named after the hero of a Wagner opera, which in turn was based on a tragic hero from German legend.

Zechariah is actually the original Biblical form of the name more often found these days as Zachariah, probably because of the popularity of Zachary. People are going to have trouble getting Zechariah because they won't understand the Zech part. This name, in whatever form, begs to be shortened in the modern world to Zach (or Zac or Zack).

Derived from Italian bello "beautiful" and vedere "view", Belvedere is a dramatic name that was used for a cartoon hound dog in George Webster Crenshaw's comic strip by the same name, which ran from 1962 to 1995.

Classic Italian name with celestial vibes.

Old Testament book way too heavy to carry.

Conjures up pleasant images of lakes, but the pronunciation challenge makes the Anglicized Loughlin preferable.

Cormorant is definitely one of the most unusual of the newly fashionable animal names, and one of the rare bird names for boys.

Dark.

Unisex option Dominique peaked for boys at Number 170 in 1991, perhaps due to the popularity of basketball player Dominique Wilkins. It's one of the most truly gender-neutral baby names right now.

Alparslan is a combination of the Turkish words alp, meaning "hero," and arslan, "lion." The name is a reference to Alp Arslan, the title given to 11th-century Seljuk sultan Muhammad bin Dawud Chaghri when his army defeated the Byzantines.

Lucretius is the name of the Roman philosopher who invented Epicureanism. But even in these days of old Roman name revival, Lucretius sounds a bit long-white-beardish, though it can be enlivened with the nickname Luc.

Despite its brotherly meaning, sounds rather formal and cold.

One of the most familiar German names, with an upright Prussian image. Friedrich might just have been out for long enough to start coming back in.

Can be used either with or without the addition of Mac.