Norse boy names
These are the names of the sagas and the myths — Sigurd, Egil, Ragnar, Thorbjorn — and they are not, for the most part, what Nordic children are called today. Norway and Denmark are full of boys named Erik, Rasmus and Anton; that is a different list and it lives on Scandinavian names. This page is the older layer: Old Norse elements, saga bearers, and the god-names Vikings used as building blocks rather than as names.
The Norse names Americans already know
Not one Norse name appears in the current U.S. top 100 — this tradition has no Liam and no Owen. What it has is a handful of names that need no introduction anyway, carried by a god, a coastline or a television series.
- ThorTHORNorse
Thunder — not a poetic gloss but the noun itself, the same word as English thunder. The red-bearded defender of gods and farmers.
- OdinOH-dinNorse
From óðr: fury, frenzy, poetic inspiration. The one-eyed god who hanged himself on the world tree to win the runes.
- BjornBYURNNorse
Bear. Once you know the j is a y it reads at a glance, which very few Norse names manage.
- LeifLAYFNorse
Heir, descendant — the one who carries the line on. Leif Eiríksson reached North America around the year 1000.
- MagnusMAG-nusLatin
Great, and not Norse at all in origin. A Norwegian king named his son for Carolus Magnus and took the second word for the first.
- RagnarRAHG-narNorse
Warrior of the gods, from regin and herr. Ragnar Loðbrók is a legend rather than a documented man; television has done the rest.
- IvarEE-varNorse
Probably bow warrior, from the yew that bows were cut from. Ivar the Boneless led the Great Heathen Army into England in 865.
- OscarOSS-kurIrish
Deer friend, or spear of god. Macpherson's Ossian poems took it to Napoleon, whose godson became Oscar I of Sweden — a Gaelic name made Nordic by a French emperor.
Traditional saga names
Men from the Icelandic sagas and the Norwegian kings' lives. Several are ordinary in Scandinavia today; several are firmly historical there and would raise an eyebrow on a newborn.
- SigurdSIG-urdNorse
Guardian of victory. The dragon-slayer of the Völsunga saga, whom German tradition calls Siegfried.
- SigmundSIG-mundNorse
Protection of victory — the same sig- with a hand rather than a guard after it. Sigurd's father in the Völsung line.
- GunnarGOON-arNorse
Warrior, fighter in battle. Gunnar of Hlíðarendi turns back for one last look at his farm and is killed for it.
- EgilAY-gilNorse
Uncertain; possibly tied to a word for a blade's edge. Egill Skallagrímsson was a poet, a berserker and the most alarming man in the sagas.
- HaraldHAH-raldNorse
Army ruler. Harald Fairhair pulled Norway into one kingdom; Harald Hardrada died at Stamford Bridge in 1066.
- HåkonHOH-konNorwegian
High son, highborn kinsman. A Norwegian royal name for eleven hundred years and still in the royal house.
- EirikAY-rikNorwegian
Ever-ruler, or sole ruler — the first element is argued over. Eiríkr rauði founded the Greenland settlement around 985.
- OlafOH-lafNorse
Ancestor's heir. Olaf II fell at Stiklestad in 1030 and became the patron saint of Norway within a year of dying.
- Knutk-NOOTNorse
Knot. Knut the Great ruled England, Denmark and Norway at once, and the tide story was told to mock flatterers, not him.
- RolfROLFNorse
Famous wolf, worn down from Hrólfr. The Viking who was granted Normandy in 911 is the same name in French mouths: Rollo.
- HjalmarYAL-marNorse
Helmeted warrior. A hero of the Hervarar saga, killed in a duel on Samsø by a cursed sword.
- RagnvaldRAHNG-valdNorse
Ruler by the counsel of the gods — regin again, this time with valdr, power.
- SteinarSTAY-narNorse
Stone warrior. Steinn, stone, is one of the busiest elements in the whole system.
- UlfOOLFOld Norse
Wolf. The plainest name imaginable and one of the commonest in the Viking age, on its own and inside longer compounds.
God names and the compounds Vikings actually used
Here is the fact that most Viking name lists get wrong. Norse parents did not hand a child a god's name whole; they used it as a first element and bolted a noun onto it. Thor-compounds are the largest single group of personal names in the Icelandic settlement records, and not one of them is Thor by itself. Bare Thor, Tyr and Frej as given names are a modern practice — a good one, but a modern one.
- ThorbjornTOR-byurnNorse
Thor's bear. This is what a Viking was actually called, and it has been in unbroken use for eleven hundred years.
- TorstenTOR-stenNorse
Thor's stone — understood as a sacred stone or altar, so the sense is closer to "dedicated to Thor" than to a rock.
- TorgnyTORG-neeNorse
Thor's din. Gnýr is the racket of a crowd or a battle, which makes the name close to onomatopoeia.
- TerjeTAIR-yehNorwegian
Thor's spear, worn down by Norwegian speech from Torgeir until the god is barely visible in it.
- TroelsTROHLSDanish
Thor plus gísl — either an arrow-shaft or a hostage, and the sources do not settle which.
- AsbjornAHS-byurnNorse
Divine bear. Here the first element is áss, a god in general rather than one in particular — the anonymous version of Thorbjorn.
- EskilESS-kilNorse
The gods' cauldron: áss again, plus ketill, the vessel. A sacrificial image rather than a kitchen one.
- IngvarING-varNorse
Ing's warrior. Ing, or Yngvi, is the older name of the god Freyr, and the element runs from Sweden to the English Danelaw.
- YngveING-vehSwedish
Yngvi itself. The Ynglinga dynasty of Uppsala claimed descent from him, which is the whole argument for their kingship.
- TyrTEERNorse
God — the plain word, not a title awarded to one. He put his hand in the wolf Fenrir's mouth as a pledge and lost it.
- FrejFRAYNorse
Lord. Freyr's name is a title that swallowed whatever he was called before it, which is why Yngvi survives beside it.
- BalderBAHL-derNorse
Traditionally "the bold one", also read as "lord". His death by a sprig of mistletoe sets the end of the world moving.
- LokeLOO-kehNorse
Unknown — no derivation has ever been agreed for Loki. Swedish parents give the name to real boys now, which the Viking Age never did.
How Norse naming works
Old Norse names were assembled rather than chosen. Two elements from a fixed stock — sig- victory, ragn- the counsel of the gods, geir spear, björn bear, steinn stone, ulfr wolf, ríkr ruler — were bolted together, and families recombined them down the generations, frequently keeping one element from the father's name so that a line could be recognised by ear. The gods went into that machine as raw material. Thor is the clearest case: the compounds are everywhere in the Icelandic settlement records, in Thorbjorn, Torsten, Torgny, Thorvald and Thorgeir, and the bare god-name is absent. Modern Norway hides the join — Tor there is often a short form of Torbjørn or Torstein rather than an invocation of anybody.
Nobody had a surname either, and Iceland still does not. A man was his father's son and nothing more: Eiríkr Þorvaldsson's boy was Leifr Eiríksson, and a daughter took -dóttir. Icelandic law still runs on that system, new family names cannot be adopted, and the telephone directory is alphabetised by first name because the second name is not a name but a relationship. It is also worth being clear about what this page is not. These are saga and revival names, read far more often than they are given; a Norwegian meeting a small Sigurd would be as mildly surprised as an Englishman meeting a small Egbert. The names Nordic parents are actually using are on Scandinavian names, and the origins index has the rest.