Star
Meaning of Star
In Anglo-American onomastic study, Star is classified as a modern lexical name, its semantic content carried intact from the Middle English sterre and ultimately the Proto-Germanic *sternō, denoting the luminous celestial bodies that served pre-industrial cultures as fixed points for navigation and as metaphors for transcendence. Although sporadically attested in parish registers of the late nineteenth century, consistent registration in the United States did not commence until the early 1920s, after which annual use has remained modest—rarely surpassing two hundred births per year and oscillating in rank between roughly 580 and 900—yet sufficiently stable to indicate a durable niche appeal rather than a transient vogue. Sociolinguistic analysis suggests that its intermittent rises, particularly during the countercultural decades of the 1960s and 1970s and again in the media-saturated 2000s, correlate with broader cultural valorizations of individuality, cosmic consciousness, and celebrity, all thematically resonant with the word’s primary denotation of brilliance and guidance. Absent any elaborate morphology or etymological obscurity, Star offers parents a monosyllabic name whose phonetic clarity and symbolic economy evoke aspiration, luminosity, and direction without recourse to ornamentation.
Pronunciation
English
- Pronunced as star (/stɑr/)
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