Favorite Italian Names

You may be surprised to know that Enzo is now a Top 100 boy name in the US, where it has been climbing straight uphill since the turn of this century.

Eva is a simple, classic Hebrew name for girls that recently slipped out of the US Top 100 for the first time in more than a decade. Pronounced either like her more popular sister Ava or less popular sister Eve, Eva is one of the elite group of girl names that mean life.

If Frederick feels too heavy, the Spanish and Italian has more energy. It's a long-term Top 20 name in Italy, and has neat nicknames like Fredo in Italian and Fede in Spanish. Famous bearers include the Spanish poet Federico García Lorca and the Italian filmmaker Federico Fellini. Further back in history, it was the name of a fifth-century Visigoth leader, the brother of Theodoric II.

As classic as it comes in Italy — Filippo was once common during the Renaissance, and today remains in the Top 25.

Flavio is derived from Flavius, a surname used in Ancient Rome. These family names, or cognomens, were given to distinguish branches of the clan and were chosen based on a characteristic of an important bearer. In this case, the Flavius family patriarch was likely blond-haired.

Francesca is a lighter and much more feminine choice than the classic Frances, and one that is increasingly popular with upscale parents.

Floral, bright, and subtly powerful, Gaia is a name with two separate origins. In Greek mythology, it is the name of the earth goddess and the universal mother, who takes her epithet from the Ancient Greek word for land or ground. It was this ecological element that led actress Emma Thompson to choose it for her daughter back in 1999, and it could hold similar appeal to green minded parents today.

This lovely alternative for the Jennifer-lover ranks among the most popular girls' names in Italy. At this point in the US, the legions of Jennifers born in the 1970s are starting to become grandmas, so Ginevra might make an apt honor name for granny Jen.

Prettier than Joy and just beginning to be used here.

Italian accent glamorizes even Judith.

Giulio is a Top 50 name in Italy, and we think Giulio is a good candidate to follow, especially now that Giovanni and Gianni are in up in the US charts. It's an interesting alternative to popular cousins Julian and Julius. And of course the most famous Giulio of all is the Emperor, Giulio Cesare.

Greta is an Old World name long tied to the iconic Garbo, but now synonymous with environmental activism.

Lavinia is a charmingly prim and proper Victorian-sounding name which actually dates back to classical mythology, where it was the name of the wife of the Trojan hero Aeneas, who was considered the mother of the Roman people.

For centuries this name was associated primarily with the towering figure of Italian Renaissance painter-scientist-inventor Leonardo da Vinci, and was scarcely used outside the Latin culture.

Though it sounds like a chopped-off variation of Olivia, which means olive, the distinctively attractive Livia has been an independent name since the days of the ancient Romans, when it belonged to Livia Drusilla—the powerful wife of the Emperor Augustus—and is still commonly heard in modern Italy.