Gearld
Masculine · “spear ruler”
Gearld is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 4,281 boys against 5 girls since 1880.
Gerald joins the spear to the word for rule, which is a very ordinary thing for a Germanic name to do — ger, a spear, plus wald, rule. Gearld transposes two of its letters and changes nothing at all in the mouth, because the vowel between the g and the r is the one English does not really say.
How old is the name Gearld?
Gearld first appears in US birth records in 1914 — 111 years ago. The typical Gearld alive today was born around 1945, making them about 80 years old. About 2,100 people named Gearld are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Gearld most popular?
Gearld peaked in 1941, reaching #485 nationally. See the whole 1941 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Gerwald to Gearld
The story of Gearld
The FitzGeralds arrived in Ireland in the twelfth century and became more Irish than the Irish, in the phrase of the period — earls of Kildare and Desmond, rebels against the crown they came with, and the source of Geraldine, which a Tudor poet built from their surname. So this Germanic compound has left more mark on Irish history than on German. The transposed spelling here is the ordinary drift of a name known by ear: the first vowel is unstressed and its letters can go in either order without changing a sound.
Meaning
spear ruler
Old Germanic ger is a spear and wald is rule or power, and the compound Gerwald is documented across the continent. The derivation is not disputed. Germanic naming built almost every name this way, out of two prestige words that did not have to make sense together — spear-rule, bright-fame, noble-wolf. Gerald came to England with the Normans, went to Ireland with the FitzGeralds, and became one of the most consequential family names there.
How the name formed
- Gerwald
- Gerald
- Gearld
Related forms: Gearóid · Gerald · Giraldo
Pronouncing Gearld
JAIR-uld
JAIR-uld, two syllables, stress at the front, the second vowel reduced. Gerald and Gearld are said identically. Irish Gearoid puts the weight at the back and sounds quite different.
Nicknames for Gearld
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
- 1914
- Most boys named
- 1941146 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #485reached in 1941
- Change vs 1987
- +10.0%11 in 1988, 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.
Gearld in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Gearóid in Irish — same name
- Gerald in German — same name
- Giraldo in Italian — same name
Gearlds among us
people named Gearld 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
Gearld 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
- The Germanic compound is settled and both halves are concrete words.
- Jerry is a ready short form and a complete name of its own.
- The Irish history attached to the name is genuinely substantial.
- Gerald is the standard spelling and this will be corrected toward it constantly.
- Because the transposition is inaudible, defending it is a purely visual argument.
- It is strongly associated with the first half of the last century.
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Gearld
Masculine
Frequently asked
- How many Gearlds are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 2,100 people named Gearld are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Gearld in 2025?
- Gearld is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 boy names.
- Will my child share the name Gearld with classmates?
- Gearld will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More G names
The most-given names starting with G, all years combined.
George#126 · Gary#1073 · Gregory#593 · Gerald#1204 · Gabriel#37 · Glenn#1443 · Gavin#303 · Gordon#1051
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Gearld? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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