Camille
Masculine · “Latin camillus”
Camille is given to girls far more often — 75,722 girls against 1,398 boys since 1880. See Camille as a girl name
Camille is a man's name in French. Camille Saint-Saens wrote the Organ Symphony; Camille Pissarro painted; Camille Desmoulins started the storming of the Bastille with a speech. The name crossed into English as female in the nineteenth century, largely through the theater, and the American male Camille peaks in 1882 among French-speaking families who never made the switch.
How old is the name Camille?
Camille first appears in US birth records in 1882 — 143 years ago. The typical Camille alive today was born around 1937, making them about 88 years old. About 500 people named Camille are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Camille most popular?
Camille peaked in 1882, reaching #837 nationally. Today it ranks #8243, 7,406 places below that high. See the whole 1882 chart.
Camille appears on this list:
Where it comes from
From Camillus to Camille
The story of Camille
The English sex of the name was settled by a play. Alexandre Dumas fils published La Dame aux Camelias in 1848 and dramatized it in 1852; the heroine is Marguerite Gautier, known by the camellias she wears. English-language productions renamed the play and the character Camille, and it became one of the great nineteenth-century stage vehicles, played by Sarah Bernhardt, Eleonora Duse and eventually Greta Garbo on film in 1936. Generations of English speakers therefore met the name attached to a famous woman, and never met the French men who carried it. The flower, incidentally, is named after Georg Kamel, a Moravian Jesuit botanist, and is unrelated to the name except by the accident of the play. The American male Camille is a francophone survival, concentrated in Louisiana and in French Canadian families.
Meaning
Latin camillus, a child attendant at a sacrifice
From the Roman family name Camillus, which was also a common noun: a camillus or camilla was a freeborn boy or girl who assisted a priest at religious rites. The word is thought to be of Etruscan origin. The Roman general Marcus Furius Camillus made the family name famous. French uses Camille for both sexes; English took it as female almost exclusively.
How the name formed
- Camillus
- Camille
Related forms: Camille · Camillo · Camilo
Pronouncing Camille
kah-MEEL
Two syllables, stress on the second, in both French and English. French makes no distinction between the male and female name in sound or spelling. The Italian and Spanish forms end in -o for men and -a for women, which English and French do not.
Nicknames for Camille
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
- 1882
- Most boys named
- 192634 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #837reached in 1882
- Change vs 2023
- 0.0%9 in 2025, from 9
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.
Camille in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Camille in French — same name
- Camillo in Italian — same name
- Camilo in Spanish — same name
INSEE rounds every published count to the nearest five for statistical confidentiality; the ranks are calculated from the exact figures. International figures from INSEE. Sources
Camilles among us
people named Camille are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 189,786 born in 2025 was named Camille
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
Fashion outlook
Camille sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Camille beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Camille in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The origin is documented back to a Roman religious office.
- It is genuinely male across the French-speaking world.
- Cam works as a short form in any setting.
- In English it will be read as a woman's name in every written context.
- Camilo and Camillo are the unambiguous masculine forms elsewhere.
- The theatrical association is strong and specifically female.
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What they receive
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Camille
Masculine · #8243 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Camilles are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 500 people named Camille are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Camille in 2025?
- Camille ranks #8243 among US boy names in 2025, with 9 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Camille?
- About 1 in every 189,786 US boys born in 2025 was named Camille — 9 in all.
- Will my child share the name Camille with classmates?
- Camille will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Camille
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Danial#8243 · Ogden#8243 · Aaren#8243 · Trinity#8243 · Kourtney#8243 · Maury#8243 · Lindon#8243 · Elbert#8243
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Camille? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Camille and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration; international figures from national statistics agencies. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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