1700s Name Generator

Eighteenth-century names were shaped by religion, region and rank far more than by fashion. In New England the Puritan habit was still strong: Old Testament names like Eliphalet, Jabez, Zadock, Keturah and Zipporah sat beside virtue and hortatory names such as Thankful, Submit, Waitstill, Freelove and Preserved. Across the Atlantic, Georgian England preferred a small stock of royal and classical names (George, Charlotte, Augustus, Sophia, Horatio, Arabella) and saved the real distinction for surnames like Tyrwhitt, Fanshawe and Haythornthwaite. Nicknames appear in legal records too: Kitty, Sukey, Betty, Polly and Moll were written into wills and ledgers, not just letters.

The surname tells you where a family stood. Southern planters carried English gentry names and Huguenot names (Fauntleroy, Taliaferro, Manigault, Ravenel); Pennsylvania German farmers were Hochstetlers, Brubakers and Oberholtzers with double given names like Johann Georg and Anna Barbara; Hudson Valley Dutch families kept Gerrit, Teunis, Annetje and Catalyntje alongside Ten Eyck and Van Wyck; New France and Acadia gave Jean-Baptiste, Marie-Josèphe and Toussaint with Lefebvre, Thibault and Comeau; Scots and Ulster settlers brought Archibald, Grizel and Lachlan with Moncrieff and Galloway.

Every name here pairs a period given name with a surname from the same community, so each reads as a plausible person from a particular place in the 1700s.