Madison (name)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Madison (name)
Family name
Pronunciation m-ah-de-sun
Meaning "Son of Matthew", "Son of Maud"
Region of origin England
Related names Madeline, Madelaine, Madeleine, Mason, Maddison

Madison is a popular unisex given name in the United States, which has grown more popular for females in recent decades. From a practically non-existent girl's name before 1985, Madison rose to being the second most popular name given to female babies in 2001.[1] The rise in popularity is due to the 1984 movie Splash, where Daryl Hannah plays a mermaid who adopts the name "Madison" in her human form after seeing a street sign for Madison Avenue.[2] When she makes this selection, Tom Hanks's character initially protests: "But Madison isn't a name!"

Originally Madison, commonly spelled Maddison in Northeastern England, was only used as a surname, a variant of Mathieson meaning son of Matthew, although possibly occasionally standing for son of Maddy, where Maddy is a pet form of Maud.[3]

Madison has declined in popularity as a girls name in the past few years, slipping to #7 by 2009.[1] Madison is also a male given name and can be found within the top 1,000 names for boys up until about 1952. Madison returned to the top 1,000 ranked boy's names in 1987, remaining there through 1999, and it also was the 858th most common boys' name in 2004, but it remains uncommon as a male given name in the United States.[1]

Surname

Given name

Male

Fictional

Female

Fictional characters

  • Madison, the mermaid in the film Splash and its sequel Splash, Too
  • Madison Duarte, in the television series South of Nowhere (2005/)
  • Madison Sinclair, in the television series Veronica Mars (2004/)
  • Madison Taylor, the Cardcaptors name for the Cardcaptor Sakura character Tomoyo Daidouji
  • Madison Rocca, the Blue Ranger in the television series Power Rangers Mystic Force
  • Madison Paige, a fictional character in Heavy Rain.
  • Madison Montgomery, "movie star", in the television miniseries American Horror Story.

See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "Popular Baby Names". Social Security Administration.
  2. ↑ Gene Weingarten (September 21, 2003). "Signs of a troubled society". Below the Beltway column in The Washington Post, lamenting the use of Madison as a female given name.
  3. ↑ P. H. Reaney; R. M. Wilson (1991). A dictionary of English surnames (3rd ed.). Routledge. p. 293. ISBN 0-415-05737-X. 

External links

This page or section lists people that share the same given name or the same family name. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change that link to point directly to the intended article.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike; additional terms may apply for the media files.