Sumer
Feminine
An hour has sixty minutes and a circle has three hundred and sixty degrees because of Sumer. The first civilization anyone has found counted in sixties, and five thousand years later every clock and every protractor on earth is still doing it.
How old is the name Sumer?
Sumer first appears in US birth records in 1971 — 54 years ago. The typical Sumer alive today was born around 1991, making them about 34 years old. About 1,500 people named Sumer are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Sumer most popular?
Sumer peaked in 1977, reaching #1331 nationally. Today it ranks #11932, 10,601 places below that high. See the whole 1977 chart.
Where it comes from
From sumor to Sumer
The story of Sumer
Sumer produced the first writing anyone has found — cuneiform, pressed into clay with a reed around 3200 BC, initially for accounting — and the first known wheel, the first known law codes, and a counting system based on sixty. That last one never left: sixty seconds, sixty minutes, three hundred and sixty degrees, and the twelve-hour clock all descend from it, because sixty divides cleanly by a great many numbers. The English word this spelling actually comes from is much smaller and much older in the language: sumor has meant the warm half of the year since before England was England, and the song Sumer is icumen in, written down around 1260, is the oldest English song whose tune survives.
Meaningscholars disagree
Not established
As an American name, Sumer is a respelling of Summer, from Old English sumor. It is also the name of the earliest known civilization of southern Mesopotamia, which is what the spelling points at, though the two are unconnected and the Sumerians called themselves something else.
How the name formed
- sumor
- summer
- Sumer
Pronouncing Sumer
SUM-er
Two syllables, stress on the first, exactly like the season. The ancient civilization is usually said SOO-mer by archaeologists, which is a different first vowel.
Nicknames for Sumer
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
- 1971
- Most girls named
- 197786 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1331reached in 1977
- Change vs 2023
- +40.0%7 in 2025, from 5
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.
Sumers among us
people named Sumer are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 229,610 born in 2025 was named Sumer
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Sumer
- #11932
- Sumer on the 2025 chart
- #160
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Sumer went to 7 girls in 2025, but Summer is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 1,980, which makes it the 160th most-given girls’ name of the year — 11,772 places above the chart.
- Summer1,973
- Sumer7
About 1 girl in 812 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 229,610 for Sumer itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Uldine test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Sumer's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Uldine climbed just as high around 1927, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Uldine's path sketches the road Sumer is walking now.
Sumer 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
Sumer beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Sumer in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Two syllables that everyone can already say and spell.
- The word behind it is one of the oldest in continuous English use.
- It is a season name without being the standard spelling of one, which is unusual.
- Summer is the standard spelling and this one will be corrected constantly.
- The single m makes it look like the ancient civilization, which it is not.
- It is a season name, and those carry a specific period of American naming with them.
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What they receive
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Sumer
Feminine · #11932 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Sumers are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,500 people named Sumer are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Sumer?
- Sumer is one of 2 recorded spellings. Summer is the more common one — 1,973 births in 2025 against 7 for Sumer.
- How popular is the name Sumer in 2025?
- Sumer ranks #11932 among US girl names in 2025, with 7 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Sumer?
- About 1 in every 229,610 US girls born in 2025 was named Sumer — 7 in all.
- Will my child share the name Sumer with classmates?
- Sumer will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Sumer
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Vina#11932 · Retta#11932 · Missouri#11932 · Iola#11932 · Eddie#11932 · Thomas#11932 · Louetta#11932 · Lu#11932
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Sumer? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Sumer and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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