Petrus

Spellings & scripts●

Locally spelled Peter in US United States, HU Hungary, DE Germany and 22 more and Piter in BR Brazil.

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●

Attested across 14 languages in the etymology graph.

Languages●

Language is read off each record's context, not declared by the bearer; a share is of all records for this spelling.

Other names spelled this way◐

Petrus is also recorded as 7 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

• Portuguese given name25K records spelled Petrus8 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in Brazil, South Africa, Spain, United States

  Languages: Portuguese, Spanish

  Also written Pétrus, Pêtrús, Petruş, Petrús, Petruș

• Swahili given name13K records spelled Petrus4 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in South Africa, Malaysia, Nigeria, Namibia

  Languages: Swahili, Southern Sotho

  Also written Petruș

• French given name11K records spelled Petrus182 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in France, United States, Canada, Belgium

  Languages: French, English, German

  Also written Pierre, Peter, Pere, Piotr, Pita

• Polish given name7.3K records spelled Petrus9 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, South Africa

  Languages: Polish, Czech, Slovak

  Also written Petruš, Petruś, Petruş

• a separate given name5.6K records spelled Petrus5 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in India, Netherlands, United States, Sweden

  Also written Petruš, Petruș, Pétrus, Petruş

• a separate given name4.6K records spelled Petrus2 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in South Africa, United States, Norway

  Also written Pétrus

• Ukrainian surname2.7K records spelled Petrus17 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, Türkiye

  Languages: Ukrainian, Russian, Uzbek

  Also written Петрусь, Петрус, Пэтрус, Петрюс, Пётрусь

62 further groups record this spelling and are not listed here.

Grouping is the name graph's, not a register's: two spellings join a group when the evidence links them, so a group is a claim about the records rather than about the people.

Other recorded senses●

Petrus 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 Latin, Greek Petros 'rock'; source of names like Petzoldt via Slavic short forms

  as a name·Deutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung

• In German, Greek 'rock'; translation of Hebrew Kephas

  as a name·Deutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung

• In German, Latinized surname form from Peter; borne by 109. Morphological transposition / learned Latinization.

  as a name·Deutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 3: Morphologie der Familiennamen

• In Dutch, Simon Peter, Cephas (Biblical character, early Christian leader)

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

• In French, Forme latine de Pierre, du latin Petrus « rocher »; fête de la Saint-Pierre.

  as a name·Dictionnaire généalogique des prénoms

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●

SE SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) — 22 years between 1999–2020. One register's own figures, never a sum across registers: two registers counting the same people would double them.

Notable people with this name●

• Peter Damianb. 1007ITnot in their usual nameeleventh-century Benedictine monk
• Petrus Christusb. 1410BEFlemish painter (c.1410-1475)
• Petrus Planciusb. 1552BEDutch-Flemish astronomer, cartographer and clergyman
• Victor Hortab. 1861BEnot in their usual nameBelgian architect, designer, publicist, teacher and creator of Art Nouveau (1861–1947)
• Peter Debyeb. 1884NLnot in their usual nameDutch-American physicist and physical chemist (1884–1966)
• Piet de Jongb. 1915NLnot in their usual nameprime minister of the Netherlands (1915–2016)
• Pim Fortuynb. 1948NLnot in their usual nameDutch politician (1948–2002)
• Davy Pröpperb. 1991NLnot in their usual nameDutch association football player
• Vincent Janssenb. 1994NLnot in their usual nameDutch association football player (born 1994)
• Robin Roefsb. 2003NLnot in their usual nameDutch association football player (born 2003)

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●

Register rows as of the 2026-09-12 data build · 223 rows in the corpus for this spelling.

Frequently asked questions

How common is the name Petrus?

We estimate roughly 1.5 million people bear Petrus (counting its spellings and scripts) across 12 countries in our records.

In which country does Petrus have the most bearers?

Petrus is most frequently recorded in Germany, where it is most often spelled peter.

How common is Petrus compared with other names?

In Germany, Petrus is the 7th most common given name of 154,506 given names recorded there.

Is Petrus a male or female name?

Petrus 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 Petrus mean?

Recorded meaning: Latinized patronymic with nominative -us; from gr.