Given name & surname
Silvester
“of the woods”
Silvester is used as a given name and a surname. One Latin interpretation is “of the woods.”
Original LatinSylvester
Meaning & origin
What it means
One Latin interpretation is “of the woods.”
Where it comes from
An origin associated with this spelling is Latin.
The story
The name’s historical associations include various early saints, most notably the first pope to govern a Church free from persecution.
Silvester through the years
- Babies since 1880
- 1,306
- 1,306 boys · 0 girls
- Most popular year
- 1960
- 32 babies
- 2025
- 0
- Outside the ranked list
- 2021–25 vs 2016–20
- —
- Too few births to compare
By the numbers
The most recent published U.S. birth count for boys is 6 in 2023. Later missing counts do not mean the name went unused. Its largest published annual count for boys was 32 in 1960. Published U.S. population figures for this spelling include 888 as a first name in 2020; 1,124 as a surname in 2020.
From Social Security birth records and U.S. Census name counts for this exact spelling. Other spellings are counted separately.
Silvester’s family of names
Silvester has a short form in Vester. In Estonian usage, Silvester shares a linguistic root with the English form Sylvester. In German usage, Silvester has a conventional equivalent in the French form Silvestre.
Inner ring: spellings · middle: nicknames and forms · outer: across languages.
Around the world
Silvester has relatives in 17 languages. Lines run from its Latin roots to each of them.
Latinwhere Silvester comes from · 1 name
Nicknames & forms 4
Diminutives, pet forms, short forms and variants used alongside the name.
Spellings & scripts 2
The same name written differently, including transliterations into other scripts.
Across languages 12
Equivalents and cognates in other languages, plus older forms it grew from.
- Silverderivative · Estonian
- Silvestreborrowing · Catalan, Spanish
- Sylvestreborrowing · French
- Silvestrafeminine form
- Silvestrocognate · Italian
- Sylvestrequivalent
- СильвестрRussian
- סילבסטרborrowing · Hebrew
Show 4 moreShow fewer
People named Silvester
- Pope Sylvester I33rd pope and saint (reigned 314-335)300–336
- Pope Sylvester IIPope of the Catholic Church from 999 to 1003
- Pope Sylvester IIIpope1000–1060
- Antipope Sylvester IVItalian presbyter and priest, antipope from 1105 to 11111050–1111
- Silvester TakačSerbian footballerborn 1940
- Silvester van der WaterDutch association football playerborn 1995
- Silvestar SabolčkiCroatian footballer (1979-2003)
- Sylvester Tung Kiem SanBishop in Denpasar, Indonesiaborn 1961
- Silvestr GogotskyRussian philosopher (1813–1889)
Listed by how widely each person is written about, which says nothing about the name itself.
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