Rhiannon
Meaning
great queen; Welsh mythological figure
Say it: ree-AN-on
The story
Rhiannon rides in from Welsh mythology, the great queen of the Mabinogi whose horse walks unhurried yet can never be caught. For centuries the name stayed inside Wales, and the US curve shows the exact moment that changed: nothing at all until the 1970s, when Fleetwood Mac released Rhiannon in 1975 and Stevie Nicks sang a Welsh legend onto American radio. Nicks famously took the name from a novel and only later discovered the mythology fit her song anyway. The curve has held steady ever since, with the 2020s matching its strongest decades, a queen who arrived by album and stayed. The song supplied recognition, while the Welsh source gives the name a history much older than its modern American chart.
Rhiannon in song
Rhiannon
Fleetwood Mac (1975)
Stevie Nicks picked the name out of a novel and only later learned it belonged to a Welsh myth, and the song became the spinning, black-shawled centerpiece of her live show.
Popularity, 1890–2024
Shape drawn from US Social Security baby-name records. Rhiannon peaked in the 2000s and the 2020s in nearly equal measure.
When you meet Rhiannon
Most people given the name Rhiannon in the United States were born between 1980 and 2009. The Rhiannon you meet today is most often in her 20s or 30s.
Estimated from US Social Security birth registrations and typical lifespans; a rough guide, not a rule.
The Rhiannon deep dive
Whether you’re naming a baby or exploring your own name’s history, this is a personal letter, not a list: where Rhiannon 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 Rhiannon fits with your family’s names and surname.
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