Murrell
Masculine
Murrell is given to both — 1,098 boys and 190 girls since 1880. See other names given to both
Murrell came into American use the way hundreds of names did in the nineteenth century — as a family surname moved to the front, usually a mother's maiden name kept alive on a child. It ran in the South around 1900 and then faded, and the record now carries it on both sides of the ledger, for sons and for daughters alike.
How old is the name Murrell?
Murrell first appears in US birth records in 1898 — 127 years ago. The typical Murrell alive today was born around 1933, making them about 92 years old. About 300 people named Murrell are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Murrell most popular?
Murrell peaked in 1904, reaching #1064 nationally. See the whole 1904 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Muriel, an ordinary English woman's name in the Middle Ages to Murrell
The story of Murrell
The Murrell who left the deepest mark was an Essex wizard. James Murrell, known for a century afterwards as Cunning Murrell, worked out of Hadleigh in the first half of the nineteenth century as a cunning man — the village trade that sat between medicine, law and magic. He told fortunes, found stolen property, treated livestock, and made iron witch bottles to break curses, one of which was still exploding on a fire in local memory decades after his death. Arthur Morrison wrote a novel about him in 1900, and his surviving tools sit in a museum, which is a better afterlife than most village magicians get.
Meaning
descended from a bearer of a medieval woman's name
The surname goes back to Muriel, an ordinary English women's name in the Middle Ages that came in from Brittany and Ireland and was built on words for the sea. Families took their name from a notable mother or grandmother more often than the record of surnames suggests, and Murrell is one of the results. It is a small thing worth knowing: a name that reads as thoroughly masculine in America descends, without any interruption, from a woman.
How the name formed
- Muriel, an ordinary English woman's name in the Middle Ages
- Murrell and Merrill emerge as surnames from it
- an Essex cunning man makes the surname locally famous
- American families move it to the front as a first name
- used for sons and daughters in the modern record
Related forms: Merrill · Muirgheal · Meriel
Pronouncing Murrell
MUR-ul
Two syllables with the weight at the front and a second syllable that almost disappears. Some families stress the back half, mur-ELL, which sounds like a different name entirely.
Nicknames for Murrell
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
- 1898
- Most boys named
- 192337 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1064reached in 1904
- Change vs 1984
- −16.7%5 in 1992, 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.
Murrell in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Merrill in English — related form
- Muirgheal in Irish — related form
- Meriel in Breton — related form
Murrells among us
people named Murrell 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
Murrell 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 has the settled, unfussy look of a surname-name without belonging to any famous family.
- It works for a child of either sex, which the record confirms rather than merely permits.
- Behind it sits a genuine and unusual piece of history: a men's name that descends from a woman's.
- American history offers one notorious Murrell — the outlaw Mark Twain reckoned had run a bigger criminal operation than Jesse James — and anyone who searches will find him first.
- It will be written Merrill, Murray and Muriel by turns, and Muriel is the one that will bother him.
- The stress is genuinely unsettled, so he will hear his own name two ways.
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Murrell
Masculine
Frequently asked
- How many Murrells 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 Murrell are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Murrell in 2025?
- Murrell is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 boy names.
- Will my child share the name Murrell with classmates?
- Murrell will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More M names
The most-given names starting with M, all years combined.
Michael#21 · Matthew#32 · Mark#244 · Mason#39 · Martin#335 · Marvin#699 · Melvin#958 · Marcus#258
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Murrell? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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