Sanskrit2 syllablesSun
Meaning: the sun.
Ravi
| Origin | Sanskrit — ravi, one of the ordinary words for the sun |
|---|---|
| Meaning | The sun; the further etymology is unsettled, and careful sources leave it there |
| Pronunciation | RAH-vee (two syllables); Bengali speakers say and write it Rabi |
| Popularity | Outside the current U.S. top 100; common across India and, more unexpectedly, in Brazil |
| Variants | Rabi (Bengali), Ravee; in compounds Ravindra, Ravichandran, Ravikumar |
| Nicknames | Rav |
| Day of the week | Sunday is ravivār, the day of Ravi |
History & meaning
Sanskrit has a surplus of words for the sun, and Ravi is the workaday one. It is a word before it is a deity: the sun as an object in the sky, the thing you point at. That everydayness is exactly why the name never feels solemn. It is also embedded in the calendar. Sunday in Hindi is ravivār, and the Indian week runs through the same seven bodies as the European one, from the moon on Monday to Saturn on Saturday, so the word is said out loud by people with no interest in mythology at all. Honesty demands one caveat: where Surya has a clean Indo-European pedigree, the deeper origin of ravi is not agreed, and it is better left open than guessed at.
Where the word does turn devotional is in the twelve names of the sun. The Sūrya Namaskār sequence is performed to a mantra for each of its twelve rounds, and Ravi is the second of them, after Mitra and before Sūrya, with Aditya ninth in the same list. The name also builds compounds: Ravindra is ravi plus indra, lord of the sun, which in Bengali pronunciation gives Rabindranath, as in Tagore. One warning for map readers. The Ravi, one of the five rivers of Punjab, is spelled the same in English but descends from the Sanskrit Irāvatī, and has nothing to do with the sun. More at Indian names.
Why parents choose it
Two open syllables, no consonant clusters, and a meaning that needs no explanation in any language. Ravi is one of the few Sanskrit names that has been absorbed outside South Asia on its own merits, which is how it ended up on Brazilian birth registers.
Middle names for Ravi
Ending on a bright vowel, Ravi takes a heavier second name well: Ravi Shankar, Ravi Anand, Ravi Nathaniel, Ravi Jagat. The first of those is a set phrase in India, so use it knowingly. The middle names guide covers pairings that already belong to someone.
Famous Ravis
Ravi Shankar, who died in 2012, took the sitar to Western concert halls and taught George Harrison. Ravi Shastri played for India and later coached the national side. Ravi Coltrane, the jazz saxophonist, was named by his parents John and Alice Coltrane after the sitarist.
Consider instead
Surya is the sun as a god rather than a word. Mihir means the sun too and is considerably rarer. Tapan, the heat-giver, is the Bengali-leaning option with the same sense and a different sound.