Meaning & origin
What it means
Taaffe goes back to Welsh Taf, meaning “a river of Wales.”
Adapted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0)
How it developed
From Welsh Dafydd, from Welsh Taf (“a river of Wales”).
Adapted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0)
The story
Published U.S. birth records include this spelling as early as 1978. This is the earliest published observation available here, rather than a date for the name’s origin.
From dated birth records
Taaffe through the years
- Babies since 1880
- 7
- 0 boys · 7 girls
- Most popular year
- 1978
- 7 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 girls is 7 in 1978. Later missing counts do not mean the name went unused. Published U.S. population figures for this spelling include 648 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.
Taaffe’s family of names
In English usage, Taaffe as a surname has a related form in Taff.
Inner ring: nicknames and forms · outer: across languages.
Nicknames & forms 1
Diminutives, pet forms, short forms and variants used alongside the name.
Across languages 1
Equivalents and cognates in other languages, plus older forms it grew from.
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