Roderick

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Boy · Germanic (Gothic), through Spanish

Roderick

Say it: ROD-er-ik

Try it with your surname

Meaning

From Germanic hrod 'fame' and ric 'ruler, powerful'.

Certainscholars agree on this meaning.

Common in medieval Spain as Rodrigo; in Scotland Roderick was used to render Gaelic Ruairidh.

Its wave through time

Fading since the 1970s

In the United States

020406018801900192019401960198020002020Peak 1971per 100,000 babies of that sex
  • 46,981 babies given this name since 1880
  • At its height in 1971, about 1 in 1,700 boys
  • 100 babies in 2020

Through the ages

  1. The Early Middle Ages400 to 800
  2. The High and Late Middle Ages1100 to 1450
  3. Victorian and Belle Époque1837 to 1914

Used by

SpanishScottishEnglish

The family of the name

SpanishRodrigo
PortugueseRodrigo
GermanRoderich
ItalianRodrigo

Famous bearers

  • Roderic, last Visigothic king of Hispania
  • Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, El Cid

Names worth a look

Where this comes from

  • Royal and noble genealogies
  • Medieval Spanish and Portuguese chronicles and charters
  • 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.