In 2006 the most popular names given to baby girls in Ukraine were Sofia, Daryna, and Khrystyna, while the most fashionable boys’ names were Vadym, Roman, Hlib, and Vladyslav, reports Interfax Ukraine. On Jan. 29 the press service of the Ministry of Justice quoted Minister Oleksandr Lavrynovych (who relied on the ministry’s civil registry statistics) as saying that other popular girls’ names are Hanna, Maria, Viktoria, Kateryna, Anastasia, Yelyzaveta, and Valeria; and other popular boys’ names are Maksym, Danylo, Denys, and Andrii.
Depending on the region, Bohdan, Nazar, Arsen, Taras, and Zorian were also popular in 2006. Among rare names used most often in 2006 were Zlata, Yesenia, Sabina, Sabrina, Nikol, Liana, Lia for girls, and for boys, Herman, Erik, Emil, Ruvim, and Renat.
Civil registrars confirm that as a rule no babies are named after politicians. For example, Viktor is encountered infrequently, whereas Yulia has been popular for a number of years.
The justice minister noted that Ukrainians increasingly seldom give their children traditional names, such as Halyna, Nina, Larysa, Zinaida, Valentyna, Hryhorii, Leonid, Stepan, Anatolii, Serhii, or Petro. More often than not such names are used in honor of a relative. At the same time, parents are increasingly giving their children rare, even unusual, names. According to the minister, this is largely explained by the influence of popular books and TV serials. Historical and biblical names are also often used.
In 2006 the following unusual names were registered in the Crimea: Iris, Ratibor, and Darwin. In Vinnytsia oblast, parents gave their babies Biblical names, such as Moisei, Serafym, Solomon, and Mahdalena. In Volyn girls were named Era and Carmelita. Names like Dobrynia, Adam, Yelysei, Maksymilian, Platon, Spartak, Yaser, Appolinaria, Hrafielita, Dzhasmin, and Shakira were registered in Dnipropetrovsk oblast.
In Donetsk region, in addition to Yehor and Daria, names such as Attillo, Ariadna, Esmeralda, and Karmen were registered. In Zhytomyr oblast babies were given such unusual names as Shokhrukhon, Esfir, and Zalman-Israel; in Zakarpattia babies were registered under the names of Izhak, Avel, Mimi, and Malvina.
In Zaporizhia oblast children were named Parno, Kniaz, Ellada, and Devradzh, while Ripsime, Brooklyn, King, and Adelfina were some of the names given to newborns in Ivano-Frankivsk oblast.
A music lover in Kirovohrad oblast named his daughter Madonna. The same oblast registered names like Florin-Daniel and Ebigail Greis were registered.
In Luhansk oblast parents named their children Farada, Platon, Fabian, Fania, and Aelita; in Lviv oblast, Anhel, Nobel, and Olvia.
Unusual names were also registered in Mykolaiv oblast: Avraam, Tamerlan, Izmail, Maria Mahdalena, Nika-Gaetana, Shukria, Zardzhynia, and Zhenivieva; in Poltava oblast: Akhlidin, Damir Roland, Dzvinka-Ivanna, and Merisabel.
In Odesa oblast children named Marshal, Serafym, Hamlet, Ozodakhon, Zhuizhui, Adbulzhakil, and Rusalka will be attending school in a few years, and in Kharkiv oblast, Kennedy, Shakhid, Zhulien-Oleksii, Avrora, and Marfa.
In Rivne oblast parents chose the following unusual names: Lev- Leonid, Yevstafii-Stanislav, and Roksolana; in Sumy oblast, Mykhailo Nanukh and Karmelitta; in Ternopil oblast, Enzhelin Van-Yu.
A boy named Lytvyn was born in Kherson oblast; Artur-Ioan in Khmelnytsky oblast, and Iglesias Armando in Cherkasy oblast.
Boys were named Gedeon, Kristian, and Jude in Chernivtsi oblast; Odissei, Melodia, and Mandinakhon in Chernihiv oblast.
Parents in Kyiv named their children Kai, Emir, Mekhrana, and Mlana; in Sevastopil, it was Fiolent, Sylvam Nadia, Iuliania, Ziioda, and Miliosha.
Other babies born in 2006 received the following unusual names: Pryntseza, Chereshnia, Tsarytsia (Zakarpattia oblast), Pryntsesa (Dnipropetrovsk oblast), Popeliushka (Poltava and Dnipropetrovsk oblasts), Atlandita (Ivano-Frankivsk oblast), Madagaskar (Zaporizhia oblast), Taimer (Luhansk oblast), Server (Zaporizhia oblast), Kosmos (Donetsk oblast), and Lymon (Zakarpattia).
