Boy · Old Norse
Leif
Say it: LAYF
Meaning
From Old Norse leifr 'heir, descendant'.
Certainscholars agree on this meaning.
Famous through Leif Erikson and widely used in 20th-century Scandinavia and among Scandinavian Americans.
Its wave through time
Popular now
In the United States
- 8,690 babies given this name since 1912
- At its height in 2020, about 1 in 7,100 boys
- 241 babies in 2020
Through the ages
- The Viking and Anglo-Saxon Age700 to 1100
- The High and Late Middle Ages1100 to 1450
- Victorian and Belle Époque1837 to 1914
- The Modern Age1880 to today
Used by
The family of the name
Other spellings: Leiv
| Old Norse | Leifr |
|---|---|
| Icelandic | Leifur |
Famous bearers
- Leif Erikson, Norse explorer of North America
Names worth a look
Where this comes from
- The Icelandic sagas and other Old Norse literature
- Viking Age runestone inscriptions
- National birth statistics of European countries source
- 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.