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Girl · Hebrew
Abigail
Say it: AB-ih-gayl
Meaning
Hebrew Avigayil, 'my father is joy' (av 'father' and gil 'joy').
Certainscholars agree on this meaning.
A Puritan name that became a 17th-century slang word for a lady's maid, then returned to fashion in the late 20th century.
Its wave through time
Popular now
In the United States
- 384,086 babies given this name since 1880
- At its height in 2003, about 1 in 115 girls
- 7,817 babies in 2020
Through the ages
- The Biblical WorldAbout 1200 BC to AD 100
- The Colonial Americas1500 to 1800
- The Age of Revolutions1750 to 1837
- Victorian and Belle Époque1837 to 1914
- The Modern Age1880 to today
Used by
The family of the name
Other spellings: Abigale, Abbigail, Abagail, Abigayle
| French | Abigaïl |
|---|---|
| Spanish | Abigail |
| Italian | Abigaille |
| Hebrew | Avigail |
| Hebrew | Avigayil |
| Spanish | Abigaíl |
Famous bearers
- Abigail, wife of King David
- Abigail Adams, American First Lady
Names worth a look
Where this comes from
- The Hebrew Bible and the New Testament
- Puritan church and town records of England and New England
- United States Social Security birth records, 1880 to today source
- Colonial records of the Americas
- United States Social Security birth records, 1880 to today source
Meanings and histories are compiled from the study of names and their languages and checked by a second review.
Meanings and histories are drawn from the study of names and their languages, each with a confidence rating; popularity figures come from official birth records. Name histories are a living field: if you know of a correction, we would be glad to hear it.