Scottish Names

A Pam for the modern age, improved by a harder edge and a tad less prissiness.

An old name still occasionally heard in the U.K., but still and perhaps forever a foreigner in the U.S. Can be spelled Ranulf.

At one time associated with the fictional detective Bulldog Drummond, this formal surname name does boast the cute nickname Drum.

Unusual and unappealing.

For towheads with ties to Scotland -- in theory, anyway.

There's a Perth in Scotland and a bigger one in Australia; this name could make a statement similar to Heath.

Earvin gained NBA fame as the birth name of Magic Johnson. If your name was Earvin, you'd probably change it to Magic too.

An old French surname derived from baille, meaning "fortification" – the same root as the English word bailey. The surname was borne by an aristocratic English family descended from French nobility.

A nice enough last name that turns supercilious as a first.

Among the more masculine of the short unisex B names, Brice is less popular than Bryce for both sexes. There were 240 boys named Brice in the US in one recent year, versus only five girls -- and more than ten times that many of both genders named Bryce.

Stronger and fresher than the original, though it may provoke the question, "Got a light?"

Wylei exists because Corey Parker decreed it so: He gave his newborn son this variation of the classic surname more conventionally spelled Wylie or Wiley. The problem with the Wylei spelling is that it makes you think the name may have a different pronunciation, with an ay versus an ee sound at the end. This is one of those creative inspirations that will make the child's life more difficult for years to come.

Distinguished actor Hume Cronyn (who shared his father's name) put this unusual choice in the lexicon.

The surname of the influential early Scottish inventor of logarithms could make an inspiring middle name choice for a mathematically inclined family.