Since I was talking about a Swiss family yesterday, it seems as if we should continue our continental talk by retreating once again back to France. You see, I was scrolling through the 2010 French data on BehindTheName, when I noticed that an awful lot of names contained the letters o and u side-by-side – especially a lot of lou names (Woo!).
Here’s a complete list of the names in alphabetical order, with the majority of meanings courtesy of MeilleurPrénoms:
BOYS:
Abdoulaye (#439) – servant of God, Arabic. Abdoulaye Méïté plays for Dijon FC and Abdoulaye Wade is the former President of Senegal.
Amadou (#468) – possibly a variant of Amadeus, which means love of God in Latin. Could also be taken from the French word amadou, which means tinder or derive from Arabic and mean praiseworthy
Ayoub (#95) – repentance, Arabic
Édouard (#209) – French form of Edward, which means guardian of wealth
Elouan (#170) – possibly derives from Celtic and means light
Lou (#451) – short for Lou- names
Louca (#307) – variation of Luke, which means from Lucania
Loucas (#325) – see Louca
Louis (#5) – derives from Ludwig and means famous warrior
Louison (#321) – could mean son of Louis or simply be a petform of the name Louis/Louise
Louka (#85) – see Louca
Loukas (#449) – see Louca
Mahamadou (#459) – praiseworthy, Arabic
Mamadou (#316) – newly weaned, Arabic
Marouane (#340) - rock, quartz, Arabic
Moussa (#251) – saved from the waters, Arabic
Ousmane (#475) – young serpent/snake, Arabic
Souleymane (#370) – healthy, intact, safe, Arabic
Titouan (#59) – variant of Antoine, which means flower, Greek or invaluable, Latin
Youcef (#335) – God will save, Hebrew
Younes (#105) – close to God, Hebrew
Youssef (#145) – see Youcef
GIRLS
Anouk (#154) – grace, Hebrew
Dounia (#237) – wealth, Arabic
Fatoumata (#214) – small camel that has just been weaned, Arabic
Leelou (#381) – variant of Lilou
Lilou (#12) – derived from the character in Luc Besson’s film The Fifth Element
Lou (#25) – short form of Lou- names
Lou-Ann (#156) – combination of the name Lou and the name Ann
Lou-Anne (#167) – variant of Lou-Ann
Louane (#29) – variant of Lou-Ann
Louann (#327) – variant of Lou-Ann
Louanne (#200) – variant of Lou-Ann
Louisa (#195) - famed warrior, Germanic
Louise (#10) – variant of Louisa
Louison (#274) – see Louison above
Louna (#19) – variant of Luna, which means moon
Lylou (#105) – see Lilou
Maimouna (#403) – happy, Arabic
Marilou (#284) – smoosh of Marie and Lou
Marylou (#291) – see Marilou
Nour (#117) – variant of Noor, which means light in Arabic
Soukaina (#486) – wellness, Arabic
Soumaya (#331) – perfect, high, Arabic
Youna (#453) – if, Celtic
Yousra (#256) – who has good character, Arabic
