The name Madeline is of Greek and English origin and means ‘high tower’. It is the English variation of Magdalen, and can also mean ‘woman from Magdala’. Magdala was a town located on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee, in ancient Palestine.
Madeline is a first name typically given to girls, but in rare cases also used as a boys name.
The first name Madeline is one of the top 100 most popular girls names in the US – currently at #92 in our SmartGenius ranking. Over 1,000 babies each year are named Madeline, accounting for approximately 0.20 % of all newborn girls. In the entire USA, approximately 187,552 people – children, adults and seniors – currently bear the name Madeline. That is 0.06 % of all living Americans.
The name Madeline is of Greek and English origin and means ‘high tower’. It is the English variation of Magdalen, and can also mean ‘woman from Magdala’. Magdala was a town located on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee, in ancient Palestine.
Madeline is also the title... of a series of children's books, written and illustrated by Ludwig Bemelmans. They were published between 1939 and 1961.
Madeline Gail Kahn (1942-1999)
Madeline was a US movie, television and theater actress. She is known for comedic roles in movies such as »What's Up, Doc?« (1972), »Young Frankenstein« (1974), and »History of the World, Part I (1981)«. In 1973 she got nominated for an Academy Award for her role in »Paper Moon« and won a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play for the comedy »The Sisters Rosensweig« in 1993.
Madeline Miller (*1978)
In 2011 Miller published her debut novel »The Song of Achilles«. A year later the US novelist was awarded the »Orange Prize for Fiction« for it. In the 17-year history of the prize, she was only the fourth writer to be honored for a debut novel. Her second novel »Circe« was published on April 10, 2018
When you hear the name Madeline, you might first think of a woman or a girl. But did you know that there are also places with the name Madeline? Are you also called Madeline? Maybe one day you will visit the places that are named just like you...
is the name of two unincorporated communites, one in Raleigh County, West Virginia, the other in Lassen County, California.
There is an asteroid called »2569 Madeline«.
The name Madeline has been used for several tropical cyclones in the Eastern Pacific Ocean in 1961, 1976, 1998 and 2016 amongst others.
Appearing throughout the time in the United States, the name Madeline is a staple in the country: Girls have been given the name Madeline for more than 140 years, according to official U.S. naming statistics. Madeline is therefore one of only 432 girls’ names that have been given every year since 1880. Even beyond that, Madeline is a very special name, which reached its peak of popularity only in the last quarter of the 20th century, ranking in the top 100 girls' names in our SmartGenius statistics: With position 49 Madeline has never been more popular than back in 1998.
In years where the graph has no value, the name Madeline was given less than five times or even none at all in the entire USA.
As many as 2,686 babies were named Madeline in the USA in 2022, ranking it #100 on the list of the most popular girls' names for that year. However, it experienced its lowest point of popularity in 1980, when it was only ranked at #687 of all female names in our SmartGenius statistics – back then only 232 girls were named Madeline.
Everyone knows her, everyone loves her and still she’s different from the mainstream: Madeline occurs in every single state of the U.S. This may sound quite unspectacular at first, but in fact, of the more than 50,000 different female first names that occur in the USA, just 537 are recorded in each individual state, so the name Madeline is definitely something very special. However, at the same time, since the name does not appear in the top 100 most common first names in any single state, Madeline is not one of those names that one encounters in every neighbourhood, but stands out from the crowd, is noticeable and special without being strange or unknown. From Alaska to Florida, a total of 187,538 women and girls of all generations bear the name Madeline – that is one in 822. However, there are considerable regional differences – the name is far more popular than average in Vermont, where one in 405 women and girls is called Madeline, while it is particularly rare in Wyoming, where you have to ask an average of 2,267 women for their name to get Madeline as an answer once.
Well, you might say, you probably figured that out yourself! But what you might not know is: The letter M is a quite popular first letter for girls' names. That’s because 8.5% of all common girls’ names in the US begin with this letter. Only the first letters A and S are more common for girls' names.
With eight letters, the name Madeline is long compared to other names. In fact, 14.5% of all common first names in the US consist of exactly eight letters. 78% of all first names are shorter, while only 8% of all boys’ and girls’ names use nine letters or even more. On average, first names in the US (not counting hyphenated names) are 6.5 letters long with no significant differences between boys' and girls' names.
Therefore: As 8.5% of all girls' names start with an M, this initial letter occurs nearly 2.5-times as often as all 26 letters on average – and the most common one of all the girls’ names starting with M is Mary.
If your name is Madeline and someone asks after your name, you can of course just tell them what it is. But sometimes that isn't so easy - what if it's too loud, and you don't understand them well? Or what if the other person is so far away that you can see them but not hear them? In these situations, you can communicate your name in so many other ways: you call spell it, sign it, or even use a flag to wave it...
So that everyone really understands you when you have to spell the name Madeline, you can simply say:
Mouse
Apple
Dinosaur
Elephant
Lion
Igloo
Nut
Elephant
Braille is made up of dots, which the blind and visually impaired can feel to read words.
Madeline
Madeline
Just use American Sign Language!
These flags are used for maritime communication - each flag represents a letter.
M
A
D
E
L
I
N
E
In the navy, sailors of two ships might wave flags to each other to send messages. A sailor holds two flags in specific positions to represent different letters.
M
A
D
E
L
I
N
E
In Morse code, letters and other characters are represented only by a series of short and long tones. For example, a short tone followed by a long tone stands for the letter A. Madeline sounds like this:
