Black
loc · Afrikaans · Latin script
Recorded for both men and women· direction only, no split published
Black is a name, most frequently recorded in South Africa. It appears chiefly in Afrikaans and English, written in the Latin script. Recorded meaning: (i) Person with dark complexion or hair; (ii) a different form of Blake; (iii) anglicization of Norman Blanc ‘white’; (iv) translation of Gaelic dark-names like Duff; (v) translation of German/Jewish.
- ZASouth Africa1 in 8◐
- MUMauritius1 in 27
- USUnited States1 in 2.1K
carrying the name, one hue, darker where it is more common. Hover a country for its figure.
- ≈158K ●
- 5 ●
- Sources
- 531 ●
- 1 in 1.3K ◐
across 14 countries
recorded for this name
1.6M records
Official registry-verified
St. Vincent & Grenadines
Spellings & scripts●
Locally spelled แบล็ค in TH Thailand, Bläck in DE Germany and Blãck in SY Syria.
Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records; ○ marks a model's transliteration. Click a spelling to open its page.
Meaning & origin●
(i) Person with dark complexion or hair; (ii) a different form of Blake; (iii) anglicization of Norman Blanc ‘white’; (iv) translation of Gaelic dark-names like Duff; (v) translation of German/Jewish names meaning ‘black’ like Schwarz.
Sources 1
- Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history]
Attested across 3 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world●
Sorted by bearers counted by national registers, records where none counts.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ZA South Africa | 4,301,177 | 3.4K rec. | — | — | Black | 86 |
| US United States | 154,738 | 1.3M rec. | 1 in 2.1K | 155K | Black | 531 |
| CA Canada | 37,261 | 34K rec. | — | — | Black | 201 |
| MU Mauritius | 21,078 | 44 rec. | — | — | Black | 10 |
| AU Australia | 1,972 | 44K rec. | — | — | Black | 219 |
| IN India | 1,633 | 2K rec. | — | 3 | Black | 62 |
| NL Netherlands | 1,030 | 1.5K rec. | 1 in 17K | 1K | Black | 54 |
| BR Brazil | 753△ | 33 rec. | 1 in 281K | 753 | — | 3 |
| GB United Kingdom | 678 | 88K rec. | — | listed | Black | 265 |
| PL Poland | 503△ | 26 rec. | 1 in 76K | 503 | — | 4 |
| MA Morocco | 472 | 1.2K rec. | — | — | Black | 23 |
| BZ Belize | 344 | 1.9K rec. | — | — | Black | 14 |
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table. How that works.
Languages●
- Afrikaans4.3M36%
- English441K4%
- Southern Sotho49K1%
- Hindi1.4K1%
- Arabic8551%
Show as table
| Name | Records | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Afrikaans | 4,301,175 | 36% |
| English | 440,906 | 4% |
| Southern Sotho | 49,160 | 1% |
| Hindi | 1,409 | 1% |
| Arabic | 855 | 1% |
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●
Black 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, From Old English blaec ‘black’; in Scotland the related blác ‘white/bright’ usually became Blake. Hugh Niger is noted in 1178; Thomas Blak in 1353.
as a nameScottish Surnames
In English, (Nobel 1988); Sea Europe, Asia;
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
In English, James. British pharmacologist
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
In English, various rivers, US
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
In English, OE blæc 'black, dark-complexioned'; first attested Wulfhun þes Blaca 901 OEByn (Somerset)
as a nameA Dictionary of English Surnames
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 |
|---|---|
| 1891 | 17 |
| 1901 | 17 |
| 1911 | 23 |
| 1921 | 23 |
| 1931 | 22 |
| 1941 | 36 |
| 1951 | 57 |
| 1961 | 49 |
| 1971 | 26 |
| 1981 | 19 |
| 1991 | 32 |
FR INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) — 11 years between 1891–1991. One register's own figures, never a sum across registers: two registers counting the same people would double them.
Notable people with this name●
- Joseph Blackb. 1728GBScottish physicist and chemist (1728–1799)
- James Whyte Blackb. 1924GBScottish doctor and pharmacologist (1924–2010)
- Shirley Templeb. 1928USnot in their usual nameAmerican actress and diplomat (1928–2014)
- Karen Blackb. 1939USAmerican actress, screenwriter, singer, and songwriter (1939-2013)
- Jack Blackb. 1969USAmerican actor, comedian, singer, musician and producer (born 1969)
- Holly Blackb. 1971USAmerican children's fiction writer
- Claudia Blackb. 1972AUAustralian actress
- Tori Blackb. 1988USAmerican pornographic actress
- Luke Blackb. 1992RSSerbian singer-songwriter (born 1992)
- Rebecca Blackb. 1997USAmerican singer
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 47 sources across 31 countries.
Reference works 5
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikipedia surname tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
- jeantosti.com — Dictionnaire des noms de famille de France et d'ailleurs (Jean Tosti)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-09-12 data build · 143 rows in the corpus for this spelling.
Frequently asked questions
- How common is the name Black?
- We estimate roughly 158 thousand people bear Black (counting its spellings and scripts) across 14 countries in our records.
- In which country does Black have the most bearers?
- Black is most frequently recorded in South Africa, where it is most often spelled black.
- What does the name Black mean?
- Recorded meaning: (i) Person with dark complexion or hair; (ii) a different form of Blake; (iii) anglicization of Norman Blanc ‘white’; (iv) translation of Gaelic dark-names like Duff; (v) translation of German/Jewish…
Query this name via API
curl https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/blackThe 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, “Black”. Data snapshot 2026-09-12.