Birk
surname · English · Latin script
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Birk is a surname, most frequently recorded in the United States. It appears chiefly in English and German, written in the Latin script. Recorded meaning: Plate shows o/ö vowel variation in this surname type.
- DKDenmark1 in 3.3K◐
- DEGermany1 in 14K
- USUnited States1 in 105K
carrying the name, one hue, darker where it is more common. Hover a country for its figure.
Meaning & origin●
Plate shows o/ö vowel variation in this surname type. Bearer count: 150.
Sources 1
- Deutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 1: Graphematik/Phonologie der Familiennamen I, Vokalismus
Attested across 6 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world●
| Country | Share of this name | |
|---|---|---|
| US United States | 27,054 | 53% |
| DE Germany | 7,769 | 15% |
| DK Denmark | 6,027 | 12% |
| GB United Kingdom | 2,116 | 4% |
| BR Brazil | 1,568 | 3% |
≈44,534 recorded bearers across the countries shown (a sample of the full distribution).
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table. How that works.
Languages●
- English27K53%
- German9.1K18%
- Danish6.2K12%
- Portuguese1.7K3%
- Spanish1.5K3%
Show as table
| Name | Records | Note |
|---|---|---|
| English | 27,009 | 53% |
| German | 9,085 | 18% |
| Danish | 6,166 | 12% |
| Portuguese | 1,731 | 3% |
| Spanish | 1,474 | 3% |
Language is read off each record's context, not declared by the bearer; a share is of all records for this spelling.
Other recorded senses●
Birk is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In English, A birch tree.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In Danish, birch
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In German, männl. Vom., in Deutschland ursprüng lich alemannische Kurzform von
as a nameDUDEN Lexikon der Vornamen
In Swedish, Birk kan gå tillbaka till Burkhard, ett tyskt namn sammansatt av burg ’borg’ och → -hard. Det har i nutiden blivit populärt i Sverige mycket tack vare den litterära gestalten Birk i Astrid Lindgrens bok Ronja rövardotter (1981). Han hette från början Bork i boken, men då det namnet var alltför likt Borka, som hans far rövarhövdingen hette, ändrade Lindgren det till Birk.
as a nameFörnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon
In enm, alternative form of birche
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Over time●
Show as table
| Year | records |
|---|---|
| 1990 | 5 |
| 1992 | 4 |
| 1993 | 8 |
| 1994 | 13 |
| 1995 | 15 |
| 1996 | 21 |
| 1997 | 19 |
| 1998 | 37 |
| 1999 | 40 |
| 2000 | 49 |
| 2001 | 54 |
| 2002 | 48 |
| 2003 | 75 |
| 2004 | 58 |
| 2005 | 56 |
| 2006 | 81 |
| 2007 | 73 |
| 2008 | 81 |
| 2009 | 84 |
| 2010 | 81 |
| 2011 | 86 |
| 2012 | 84 |
| 2013 | 72 |
| 2014 | 77 |
| 2015 | 75 |
| 2016 | 90 |
| 2017 | 103 |
| 2018 | 98 |
| 2019 | 74 |
| 2020 | 62 |
| 2021 | 92 |
| 2022 | 164 |
| 2023 | 167 |
| 2024 | 177 |
| 2025 | 251 |
NO SSB — Navn (1880–present) — 35 years between 1990–2025. One register's own figures, never a sum across registers: two registers counting the same people would double them.
Notable people with this name●
- Georg Birkb. 1839DEGerman politician, printer and entrepreneur (1839-1924)
- Ado Birkb. 1883EEEstonian politician (1883-1942)
- Johannes Birkb. 1893DKDanish gymnast
- Heinrich Birkb. 1898DEGerman viticulturist (1898-1973)
- Alma Birkb. 1917GBBritish politician (1917-1996)
- Anne Birkb. 1942DEGerman author (1942–2009)
- Sandow Birkb. 1962USAmerican illustrator and graphic artist (born 1962)
- Dietrich Birkb. 1967DEGerman politician
- Matt Birkb. 1976USAmerican football player (born 1976)
- Carmen Birkb. 1980DEGerman actress
The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).
Evidence●
Attested in 46 sources across 23 countries.
Reference works 3
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-09-12 data build · 250 rows in the corpus for this spelling.
Frequently asked questions
- How common is the name Birk?
- Our records include 44,534 bearers of Birk across 5 countries — a sample of the full distribution.
- In which country does Birk have the most bearers?
- Birk is most frequently recorded in the United States.
- What does the name Birk mean?
- Recorded meaning: Plate shows o/ö vowel variation in this surname type.
Query this name via API
curl https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/birkThe same payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. Rate-limited for casual use. Bulk access and licensing.
About this data
Data snapshot . Figures are rebuilt periodically and will change.
Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.
Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.
Cite this page Mondonomo, “Birk”. Data snapshot 2026-09-12.