Abbigail
Meaning of Abbigail
Abbigail, a deliberate respelling of the Hebrew-derived Abigail, retains the etymological sense of “my father is joy” while signaling, through its doubled internal consonant, the late-20th-century Anglo-American preference for visually distinctive orthography. The name’s historical resonance reaches back to the Old Testament narrative in which the original Abigail, noted for intelligence and diplomatic poise, becomes the wife of King David; in early New England the name migrated into Puritan usage, and its modern variant spellings, including Abbigail, evolved as parents searched for recognizable yet individualizing forms. United States birth-record data show that Abbigail first appeared sporadically in the national statistics during the 1950s, rose gradually through the 1980s, and achieved its highest recorded frequency in 2009, when 676 newborns bore the name and it occupied rank 415; subsequent annual tallies display a measured decline to 37 occurrences and rank 913 in 2024, illustrating the typical life-cycle curve of a nonstandard variant. Phonetically unchanged from Abigail and pronounced AB-ih-gayl (/ˈæb.ɪ.ɡeɪl/), the name offers parents a familiar auditory profile coupled with a typographic signature, thereby balancing tradition with subtle individuality.
Pronunciation
English
- Pronunced as ab-i-gale (/ˈæb.ɪ.ɡeɪl/)
U.S. Popularity Chart
