Martial
given name · French · Latin script
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Martial is a given name, with more bearers in France than in any other country. In Cameroon it is the 33rd most common given name. It appears chiefly in French and English, written in the Latin script. Recorded meaning: From Latin Martialis, 'of Mars' or 'war-like'.
- CMCameroon1 in 922◐
- FRFrance1 in 1.8K
- CACanada1 in 73K
carrying the name, one hue, darker where it is more common. Hover a country for its figure.
- ≈37K ●
- Sources
- 304 ●
- 1 in 1.8K ◐
across 6 countries
82K records
Official registry-verified
France
Meaning & origin●
From Latin Martialis, 'of Mars' or 'war-like'.
Sources 1
- Le grand guide des prénoms (Enfant - Education)
Attested across 6 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 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FR France | #420 | 36,770 | 74K rec. | 1 in 1.8K | 37K | Martial | 304 |
| CM Cameroon | #33 | 2,114 | 2.1K rec. | — | — | Martial | 40 |
| CA Canada | — | 1,142 | 1.2K rec. | — | 1 | Martial | 79 |
| BE Belgium | — | 883 | 1K rec. | — | 125 | Martial | 55 |
| CI Côte d’Ivoire | #752 | 612 | 639 rec. | — | — | Martial | 30 |
| GP Guadeloupe | #293 | 500 | 19 rec. | — | 5 | Martial | 4 |
| CH Switzerland | — | 450 | 261 rec. | — | 15 | Martial | 50 |
| US United States | — | 391 | 1.5K rec. | 1 in 851K | 391 | Martial | 122 |
| MQ Martinique | #457 | 290 | 22 rec. | — | 5 | Martial | 13 |
| CD Congo - Kinshasa | #361 | 212 | 212 rec. | — | 1 | Martial | 4 |
| VN Vietnam | — | 62 | 29 rec. | — | — | Martial | 11 |
| SE Sweden | — | 20△ | 3 rec. | 1 in 510K | 20 | — | 4 |
Roughly 37K people in France bear this name (about 1 in 1.8K). Estimates project the name's share of our records onto national population, so each is only as good as the record base beside it — the Basis column gives that base; rows marked △ rest on fewer records than the estimate itself and are order-of-magnitude at best.
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table. How that works.
Languages●
- French202K94%
- English4.2K2%
- French (Côte d’Ivoire)3.5K2%
- Spanish6471%
- German5281%
Show as table
| Name | Records | Note |
|---|---|---|
| French | 201,907 | 94% |
| English | 4,217 | 2% |
| French (Côte d’Ivoire) | 3,461 | 2% |
| Spanish | 647 | 1% |
| German | 528 | 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●
Martial 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 French, Comme Mars était le dieu de la guerre chez les Romains (l’équivalent d’Arès chez les Grecs), tout ce qui a trait à la guerre, à l’armée, voire au caractère belliqueux porte le qualificatif de martial : cour martiale, loi martiale…
as a name2500 noms propres devenus communs : dictionnaire étymologique (éponymes, antonomases et hypallages)
In French, Du latin Martialis, « de Mars »; nom de saint Martial (fête locale le 30 juin).
as a nameDictionnaire généalogique des prénoms
In French, Du latin Martialis, « dédié à Mars »; fête le 11 juillet.
as a nameDictionnaire généalogique des prénoms
In French, Dérivé de Martin; origine latine, signifie « guerrier ».
as a nameLe grand guide des prénoms (Enfant - Education)
In French, du nom latin Martiālis, dérivé de Mars.
as a nameDictionnaire des noms de famille du Canada français. Anthroponymie et généalogie. 2e édition
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 |
|---|---|
| 1902 | 5 |
| 1903 | 5 |
| 1904 | 5 |
| 1905 | 5 |
| 1906 | 5 |
| 1907 | 5 |
| 1909 | 5 |
| 1910 | 5 |
| 1911 | 5 |
| 1912 | 5 |
| 1913 | 5 |
| 1914 | 5 |
| 1915 | 5 |
| 1916 | 5 |
| 1917 | 5 |
| 1918 | 10 |
| 1919 | 10 |
| 1920 | 5 |
| 1921 | 10 |
| 1922 | 10 |
| 1923 | 5 |
| 1924 | 5 |
| 1926 | 5 |
| 1927 | 15 |
| 1928 | 10 |
| 1929 | 10 |
| 1930 | 10 |
| 1931 | 5 |
| 1932 | 5 |
| 1933 | 15 |
| 1934 | 5 |
| 1935 | 5 |
| 1936 | 10 |
| 1937 | 10 |
| 1938 | 10 |
| 1939 | 10 |
| 1940 | 5 |
| 1941 | 5 |
| 1942 | 10 |
| 1943 | 5 |
| 1944 | 10 |
| 1945 | 5 |
| 1946 | 10 |
| 1947 | 5 |
| 1948 | 5 |
| 1949 | 10 |
| 1950 | 10 |
| 1951 | 5 |
| 1952 | 10 |
| 1954 | 5 |
| 1955 | 5 |
| 1957 | 5 |
| 1958 | 5 |
| 1959 | 5 |
| 1960 | 10 |
| 1961 | 10 |
| 1963 | 10 |
| 1964 | 5 |
| 1965 | 10 |
| 1966 | 10 |
| 1967 | 10 |
| 1968 | 10 |
| 1969 | 5 |
| 1970 | 10 |
| 1971 | 5 |
| 1972 | 10 |
| 1976 | 5 |
GP INSEE — Fichier des prénoms (births by department), dpt 971 (Guadeloupe) — 67 years between 1902–1976. One register's own figures, never a sum across registers: two registers counting the same people would double them.
Notable people with this name●
- Saint Martialb. 300FR3rd century founding bishop of Limoges
- Joseph Marie Martial Walkerb. 1784USAmerican politician, Louisiana (1784-1856)
- Martial de Guernon-Ranvilleb. 1787FRFrench magistrate and politician (1787-1866)
- Martial Caillebotteb. 1853FRFrench photographer, composer and philatelist (1853–1910)
- Martial Gueroultb. 1891FRFrench philosopher (1891–1976)
- Martial Valinb. 1898FRFrench aviator (1898-1980)
- Martial Célestinb. 1913HTHaitian Prime Minister (1913-2011)
- Martial Solalb. 1927FRFrench jazz pianist and composer (1927–2024)
- Martial Raysseb. 1936FRFrench plastician (born 1936)
- Patrick de Carolisb. 1953FRnot in their usual nameFrench journalist
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 45 sources across 27 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des prénoms (1900–2024) | 2024 | 37K | #1,654 |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1991 | 537 | — |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 391 | #24,355 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2020 | 2020 | 354 | #61,280 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010 | 2010 | 246 | #77,788 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2000 | 2000 | 187 | #91,404 |
| BE Belgium | Familienaam.be — Belgian family-name frequency (population register) | 2008 | 125 | #12,907 |
| GA Gabon | Ministere de l'Interieur — 2025 candidate lists (local + legislative) | 2025 | 70 | #32 |
| FI Finland | DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup) | — | 43 | #9,505 |
| FI Finland | DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup) | — | 30 | #17,021 |
| IN India | Instate — India surnames by state (real counts) from electoral rolls | — | 24 | #807 |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname) | — | 23 | #177,962 |
Reference works 5
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikipedia given-name 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 · 245 rows in the corpus for this spelling.
Frequently asked questions
- How common is the name Martial?
- We estimate roughly 37 thousand people bear Martial (counting its spellings and scripts) across 6 countries in our records.
- In which country does Martial have the most bearers?
- We estimate about 37 thousand people bear Martial in France, more than in any other country in our records, where it is most often spelled martial.
- How common is Martial compared with other names?
- In France, Martial is the 420th most common given name of 711,207 given names recorded there.
- Is Martial a male or female name?
- Martial is a male name in our records. Opposite-gender entries fall within the cross-gender noise we measure in the source data, so we don't report them as usage.
- What does the name Martial mean?
- Recorded meaning: From Latin Martialis, 'of Mars' or 'war-like'.
Query this name via API
curl https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/martialThe 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, “Martial” — the 420th most common given name in France. Data snapshot 2026-09-12.