Godfrey

Where Godfrey comes from

From Old French Godefrei, from Old High German Godafrid (“peace of God”), from Proto-Germanic *Gudafriþuz. Equivalent to god + frith. Doublet of Gottfried and Geoffrey.
— Wiktionary's entry for Godfrey
  • Germanic
  • 2 syllables
  • Vowel-ended
Along the way
  1. 1646
    Godfrey Kneller born
    German-born British painter
  2. 1880
    First SSA year
    Already #640 among boys — 9 babies in the first year on record.
  3. 1888
    Peak, #554
    13 babies named Godfrey — more than any year before or since.
  4. 1889
    The fade
    The first year with half the peak's births — down to #878.
  5. 1919
    Godfrey Hounsfield born
    English electrical engineer
In the dictionary
  • A male given name from the Germanic languages.
Namesakes
  • Godfrey Hounsfield · English electrical engineer, 1919–2004
  • Godfrey Kneller · German-born British painter, 1646–1723
  • Godfrey Gao · Taiwanese-Canadian actor and model, 1984–2019
  • Godfrey Binaisa · Ugandan President from May 1979 to June 1980, 1920–2010
  • Godfrey Chitalu · Zambian footballer, 1947–1993

Sources: the origin note and dictionary entry are quoted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0); the namesakes come from Wikidata (CC0); the milestones are worked out from the SSA record.