Valdemar
Masculine · “ruler of the world”
Valdemar looks like a Germanic name and is not. It is Vladimir, borrowed into Danish by a king whose Russian great-grandfather he was named for, and then reshaped by Scandinavian mouths until the Slavic elements had been quietly replaced by Germanic ones that sounded similar. Very few names record a family alliance and a linguistic accident this clearly.
How old is the name Valdemar?
Valdemar first appears in US birth records in 1912 — 113 years ago. The typical Valdemar alive today was born around 1976, making them about 49 years old. About 700 people named Valdemar are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Valdemar most popular?
Valdemar peaked in 1953, reaching #1900 nationally. Today it ranks #12008, 10,108 places below that high. See the whole 1953 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Volodimer to Valdemar
The story of Valdemar
Valdemar the Great ruled Denmark in the twelfth century and was named for his mother's family: she was a princess of Kiev, and her grandfather was Vladimir Monomakh. The name became royal in Denmark and stayed so through several more kings, spreading from there into Sweden, Norway and eventually Germany and Poland. The Slavic name went west, changed shape to fit a Germanic language, and became so thoroughly Scandinavian that hardly anyone hears the Kiev in it. American records carry it with the Scandinavian migration, and it has always been rare here.
Meaningscholars disagree
ruler of the world, or famous ruler
The Slavic original joins a verb meaning to rule to mir, which means both peace and world — so Vladimir is a ruler of the world or a ruler of peace, and Slavic speakers have argued about which for centuries. Germanic speakers, hearing the name, reanalyzed it as wald, rule, plus mar, famous, which is what the Scandinavian and German spellings now suggest. Both readings are alive, and one of them is a misunderstanding that stuck.
How the name formed
- Volodimer
- Vladimir
- Valdemar
Related forms: Valdemar · Valdemar · Vladimir · Waldemar · Włodzimierz
Pronouncing Valdemar
VAL-deh-mar
Three syllables, stress on the first in Danish and Swedish. English speakers often move it to the second, giving val-DEE-mar. Both are heard in America, and neither causes confusion.
Nicknames for Valdemar
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
- 1912
- Most boys named
- 199420 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1900reached in 1953
- Change vs 2022
- 0.0%5 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.
Valdemar in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Valdemar in Danish — same name
- Valdemar in Swedish — same name
- Vladimir in Russian — same name
- Waldemar in German — spelling variant
- Włodzimierz in Polish — same name
Valdemars among us
people named Valdemar are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 341,615 born in 2025 was named Valdemar
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Ethridge test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Valdemar's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Ethridge climbed just as high around 1917, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Ethridge's path sketches the road Valdemar is walking now.
Valdemar 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
Valdemar beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Valdemar in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- It is a royal name in Denmark with an unbroken record going back eight centuries.
- Val and Demar are both usable and belong to different worlds.
- The story behind it — a Slavic name reshaped by a Germanic language — is genuinely unusual and easy to tell.
- Every syllable is easy for an English speaker to produce.
- Three syllables and eight letters is a substantial name, though the short forms are ready.
- Waldemar is the German and Polish spelling of the same name and will be written instead by anyone from that tradition.
- It is strongly marked as Scandinavian, which is a fact to weigh rather than a fault.
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Valdemar
Masculine · #12008 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Valdemars are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 700 people named Valdemar are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Valdemar in 2025?
- Valdemar ranks #12008 among US boy names in 2025, with 5 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Valdemar?
- About 1 in every 341,615 US boys born in 2025 was named Valdemar — 5 in all.
- Will my child share the name Valdemar with classmates?
- Valdemar will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Valdemar
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Garfield#12008 · Chas#12008 · Lew#12008 · Barney#12008 · Dewitt#12008 · Granville#12008 · Cicero#12008 · Willam#12008
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Valdemar? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Valdemar and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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