Butler
Masculine · “a bottle-bearer”
A butler was the man in charge of the bottles. The word comes from the Old French for a bottle-bearer, and the job began as the officer responsible for the wine cellar of a great house — the most trusted servant in the building, because he had the keys to the most stealable thing in it.
How old is the name Butler?
Butler was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Butler alive today was born around 1924, making them about 101 years old. About 200 people named Butler are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Butler most popular?
Butler peaked in 1886, reaching #512 nationally. See the whole 1886 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From a Latin word for a cask gives Old French its bottle-bearer to Butler
The story of Butler
The rise of the word tracks the rise of the household. In a medieval great house the butler ranked immediately below the steward and above everybody else; by the nineteenth century, when country houses had dozens of servants and elaborate hierarchy, he ran the entire indoor staff on the male side and answered only to the master. The job has almost vanished and the word has not: it is still understood everywhere, mostly through fiction, and almost nobody who uses it knows it is about wine.
Meaning
a bottle-bearer
The word and the surname both come from the same French source, and the Latin behind it is the word for a cask. The office was grand: in England the Chief Butler of Ireland was a hereditary crown appointment, and the family that held it took Butler as their surname and became one of the great Anglo-Irish dynasties. So the surname can be a servant's or an earl's, and the record does not distinguish.
How the name formed
- a Latin word for a cask gives Old French its bottle-bearer
- the office of butler in medieval households
- an Anglo-Irish dynasty takes the name from the hereditary post
- the surname becomes an American first name
- used in the record from before 1880
Related forms: Bouteiller · de Buitleir
Pronouncing Butler
BUT-lur
Two syllables, stress at the front, exactly like the word. There is no competing reading.
Nicknames for Butler
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1880
- Most boys named
- 191931 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #512reached in 1886
- Change vs 1980
- −40.0%6 in 1996, from 10
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Butler in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Bouteiller in French — related form
- de Buitleir in Irish — related form
Butlers among us
people named Butler are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Butler sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- It is read correctly at sight and needs no explanation.
- It has a concrete and rather grand history behind it.
- It is genuinely unrepeated as a first name.
- It is the name of a domestic occupation, and that is what people will hear.
- It reads unmistakably as a surname.
- It belongs to the oldest layer of the American record.
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Butler
Masculine
Frequently asked
- How many Butlers are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 200 people named Butler are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Butler in 2025?
- Butler is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 boy names.
- Will my child share the name Butler with classmates?
- Butler will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More B names
The most-given names starting with B, all years combined.
Brian#339 · Benjamin#11 · Brandon#261 · Bryan#336 · Bruce#536 · Billy#1068 · Bobby#1097 · Bradley#403
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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