Ofc Mohammed is the most common name but thats a name common within the muslim community. I have noticed the name Sarah in every country, regardless of race or religion. Or it might be an abrahamic religion thing but thats most of the world atleast.

I suspect other Abrahamic names might make the cut.

  • fubo@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    There are also a few names that independently exist in different languages; i.e. one is not a translation of the other, such as “Yuri” in Russian and Japanese, or “Naomi” in Hebrew and Japanese. Similarly, the surname “Lee” in English is not related to “Lee” in East Asian languages like Chinese or Korean.

    (A sillier puzzle: Find names for which you get a different name by spelling it backwards, like “Ari” and “Ira” or “Linus” and “Sunil”. No, Utah Mormon names like “Nevaeh” don’t count, they do that sort of thing on purpose.)

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    Hard to say. Like, do “Ivan”, “Giovanni” and “John” count as the same, or different names? What about Latin “Amanda” (to be loved) vs. Japanese 愛/Ai (love)? How do we even count this?

    • ℕ𝕖𝕞𝕠@midwest.social
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      1 year ago

      Ivan, Giovanni, John, Jean, Shaun, Sean, Shane, Zane, Ian, Jan, Yves, Juan, Johannes, Yohan, and more…

      The name means “gift”. Pretty universal.

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        Everyone is saying it means “gift” but Wikipedia (as well as an embroidery my grandma gave me when I was young!) says it comes from Yohanan/Johanan יוֹחָנָן‎ (Yôḥānān), which means “YHWH (Yahweh/God) is gracious”, with gracious being used in the form of “merciful” or “forgiving”.

        Which can kind of mean the same thing but is also different enough. Johnathan, however, does mean “God has given”.

        TIL that John and Johnathan are not different versions of the same name!

      • mr47@kbin.social
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        Ironically, all the variations you mentioned do not have the gift part, except for the letter ‘n’ :)

        They all originate from Johnathan, which in Hebrew means, literally “God gave”, the “Joh” part meaning “God”, and “Nathan” meaning “gave”.

      • SnokenKeekaGuard@lemmy.dbzer0.comOP
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        1 year ago

        Despite how many forms it takes, it isn’t very common in the muslim world or asia which make up for a vast proportion of the world. So many of the names variations are within Europe.

          • SnokenKeekaGuard@lemmy.dbzer0.comOP
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            1 year ago

            Theodore, Mateo, matthew, jonathan, jesse, gia, Anjali, Doris. Theres like 30 more, I didnt notice a super common asian name, anjali is fairly common in india. But yeah name meaning gift is probably up there.

        • andallthat@lemmy.world
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          John the Baptist is considered a prophet also in Islam, so local variations of the name John are not so infrequent in Muslim countries, at least according to Wikipedia, see Yahya.

    • SnokenKeekaGuard@lemmy.dbzer0.comOP
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      Names with the same meaning is an interesting one. Id say that counts, I hadnt even thought about that!

      I’d also allow variations of the name, John is Yuhanna in arabic.

      • Lvxferre@lemmy.ml
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        I don’t know the answer, but at least this gives us some way to actually count this:

        • check which languages encompass 90% (or more) of the native speakers of Earth
        • check the most names that fit 90% (or more) of the native speakers of each language
        • sum up names across languages that you deemed to be “the same”, like John and Yuhanna

        There’ll be a tiny bit of error there, but given that you’re focusing only on the most common name, I guess that it’s fine.

        I wonder if there’s some previous research on that. Digging further yielded nothing for me. (You got me curious, too.)

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    Probably any form of Maria, which is for both male/female. There are many documented usages of the name BCE.

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    The most common first name in the world is Maria, and the most common last name in the world is Wang. Erfo the most common name in the world is Maria Wang.

  • SnokenKeekaGuard@lemmy.dbzer0.comOP
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    Joseph/ Yousuf, Daniel/ Danyal. Again anything universal is Abrahamic just bc of what high proportion of the world is Christian/ Muslim/ Jew.

      • DrQuint
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        I find that Ana beats out Maria only because only the english spell it/pronounce it different (Hanna). Everyone else does Ana.

        But Mary has an absurd higher usage.

  • sylver_dragon@lemmy.world
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    India and China each have around 1.4 billion people (source). The next nearest country is the US with ~340 million. Which is a pretty major drop off. So, I would start by looking at common names in either China or India.

    • SnokenKeekaGuard@lemmy.dbzer0.comOP
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      The most common Indian names are Hindu names which are isolated in India. Similarly the most common names in China are isolated there. Hence my argument for Abrahamic religions.

  • Call me Lenny/Leni
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    I don’t know about first names, but as for middle names, I’ve noticed a 75% chance your middle name will be James if you’re a guy and Marie if you’re a woman. I also attended school somewhere where, I kid you not, every shop owner and public service manager was named either John or Julie.

    • fubo@lemmy.world
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      On the other hand, if your parents give you the middle name of Wayne, an FBI file is opened immediately.

      • Call me Lenny/Leni
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        I’m surprised you don’t see more FBI agents in Gotham. It’s a cesspool of crime, you’d think at least one person would at least be raided by a swat team.

        • DrQuint
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          Or maybe the place is so infested that the moment a team raids a guy, they get counter-ambushed on the way out.

        • danhakimi@kbin.social
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          supposedly, the Feds at some point gave up on Gotham and said "fuck it, it’s hopeless, let them keep to themselves, as long as they’re not leaving we’re good.

    • Tarte@kbin.social
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      Since Mohammed in various variants accounts for almost 2% of all humans (4% of males), this seems plausible, regardless of how many Mikes there are.