Lorrain
Feminine · “From Lorraine”
Lorrain is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 636 girls against 10 boys since 1880.
Lorrain is Lorraine without its final e, the name of a French region that gave the world two very different painters: Claude, whose golden landscapes were copied so often he kept a book to prove which were his, and Georges de La Tour, who painted by candlelight and was forgotten for three hundred years.
How old is the name Lorrain?
Lorrain first appears in US birth records in 1913 — 112 years ago. The typical Lorrain alive today was born around 1946, making them about 79 years old. About 300 people named Lorrain are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Lorrain most popular?
Lorrain peaked in 1921, reaching #1867 nationally. See the whole 1921 chart.
Where it comes from
From Lotharingia to Lorrain
The story of Lorrain
Claude Gellée, born in Lorraine and known ever after as Claude Lorrain, became the most admired landscape painter in seventeenth-century Rome, and his work was so imitated that he began the Liber Veritatis, a book of drawings recording each painting he sold, so that buyers could tell his work from the forgeries. His contemporary Georges de La Tour spent his life in Lorraine painting quiet scenes lit by a single candle; after his death he was forgotten so completely that his pictures were credited to other artists until a German scholar identified him in 1915. Lorrain, without the e, was an American spelling of the name in the early twentieth century.
Meaning
From Lorraine, the region of northeastern France
Lorraine comes from the medieval kingdom of Lothar, one of Charlemagne's grandsons.
How the name formed
- Lotharingia
- Lorraine
- Lorrain
Related forms: Lorraine · Lothringen · Loraine
Pronouncing Lorrain
luh-RAYN
Two syllables with the stress on the second, like Lorraine.
Nicknames for Lorrain
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
- 1913
- Most girls named
- 192122 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1867reached in 1921
- Change vs 1983
- −16.7%5 in 1990, from 6
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.
Lorrain in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Lorraine in French — spelling variant
- Lothringen in German — related form
- Loraine in English — spelling variant
Lorrains among us
people named Lorrain 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
Lorrain 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
- Sounds exactly like Lorraine, a name everyone knows.
- Tied to a real region with a rich artistic history.
- Very rare in this spelling.
- Almost everyone will add the e, so it will need pointing out.
- It reads as an early-twentieth-century name.
- The spelling is recorded for a handful of boys too; a boy called Lorrain would usually be taken for a girl.
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What they receive
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Lorrain
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Lorrains are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 300 people named Lorrain are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Lorrain in 2025?
- Lorrain is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Lorrain with classmates?
- Lorrain will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More L names
The most-given names starting with L, all years combined.
Linda#902 · Lisa#987 · Laura#379 · Lauren#401 · Lillian#57 · Lori#1721 · Louise#514 · Lois#1666
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Lorrain? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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