Given name & surname · also Middle English
Wales
“Celt, Roman”
Wales is a surname from Middle English, ultimately from Proto-Germanic.
Meaning & origin
What it means
Wales goes back to Proto-Germanic *walhaz, meaning “Celt, Roman.”
Adapted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Where it comes from
Wales comes from Middle English, and ultimately from Proto-Germanic.
Adapted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0)
How it developed
From Middle English Wales, from Old English Wealas, from Proto-West Germanic *walh, from Proto-Germanic *walhaz (“Celt, Roman”).
Adapted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0)
The story
Published U.S. birth records include this spelling as early as 1914. This is the earliest published observation available here, rather than a date for the name’s origin.
From dated birth records
Wales through the years
- Babies since 1880
- 38
- 38 boys · 0 girls
- Most popular year
- 1939
- 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 boys is 5 in 1968. Later missing counts do not mean the name went unused. Its largest published annual count for boys was 7 in 1939. Published U.S. population figures for this spelling include 4,789 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.
Wales’s family of names
The ring: across languages.
Across languages 4
Equivalents and cognates in other languages, plus older forms it grew from.
Similar names
If you love Wales, these share its style, era, origin or sound, from outside its own family.
Wendel
“one who travels; a wanderer”
>99% boys
Carles
Carles is a masculine given name from Latin, ultimately from Proto-Germanic. It is used in Spanish and Catalan.
>99% boys
Ned
“a wealthy protector”
>99% boys
Wendell
“one who travels; a wanderer”
99% boys · 1% girls
Tex
“man from Texas”
>99% boys
Prentice
“a student; an apprentice”
95% boys · 5% girls
Woody
“a woman of the forest” · “a man of the forest”
>99% boys
Donis
Donis is used as a given name and a surname. Donis is connected with Adonis.
>99% boys