Edson
Meaning
son of Ede (English surname); famously borne by Pelé, born Edson Arantes do Nascimento and named after Thomas Edison; a Brazilian classic of the 1950s through 70s
The story
Edson began as an English surname, son of Ede, but its place in history was fixed in a small Brazilian town in 1940, when a father who admired the inventor Thomas Edison named his boy Edson Arantes do Nascimento. The world came to know that boy as Pelé: three World Cups, more than a thousand goals by his own famous count, and a standing claim to being the greatest player of the twentieth century. He liked to say that Edson was the person and Pelé the myth. In American records Edson has kept a quiet, steady presence for generations, never fashionable and never gone, familiar in Brazil and across the Portuguese-speaking world and carried here by families who know exactly whom it honors. It is the subtle route to a giant legacy: the name on Pelé's birth certificate rather than the one on his shirt.
Popularity, 1890–2024
Shape drawn from US Social Security baby-name records. Edson peaked in the 2000s and the 2020s in nearly equal measure.
Popularity in Brazil
391,040 people · the #71 first name in Brazil · about 1 in 519 · median age 46
Among people named Edson living in Brazil at the 2022 census, more were born in the 1970s than in any other decade.
The census also counted 2,108 born between 2020 and August 2022, too recent a span to chart.
Source: IBGE, Censo Demográfico 2022
When you meet Edson
Most people given the name Edson in the United States are teenagers or young adults today.
Estimated from US Social Security birth registrations and typical lifespans; a rough guide, not a rule.
The Edson deep dive
Whether you’re naming a baby or exploring your own name’s history, this is a personal letter, not a list: where Edson truly comes from, how it traveled, and what a century of records reveals. If you have grown a tree on nametree, it also considers how Edson fits with your family’s names and surname.
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