Richards have been kings, actors and Virgin billionaires. Today, it would appear, they are an endangered species.

The number of babies called Richard, once Britain's favourite name, has plummeted over the past century. According to research on the names that were most popular then, Percy, Walter, Herbert, Clifford, Edna, Ethel, Elsie and Mabel have also suffered at the hands of fashion. There were 1,048 Gertrudes born in 1907, but not one baby girl was given the name in England and Wales in 2005.

But it is Richard, meaning “powerful ruler” and Britain's most widely used name 200 years ago, that has suffered perhaps the most surprising decline.

In 1807 there were no fewer than 4,671 infant Richards, and even a century later, there were 2,289. But by 2005, this figure had fallen to 538, according to research for the mother-and-baby social networking site gurgle.com.

“Do you think it could be 'Dick'?” asked Justine Roberts, co-founder of the parenthood website Mumsnet.com, whose users discuss what to call their children. “One of the issues is the potential for embarrassing nicknames.” Ms Roberts said that while some parents sought out the unusual, a “critical mass” of children with a name helped parents to feel comfortable using it. “Every parent is conscious of not giving their child a name that is going to lead to them being persecuted.”

Last year the favourite names were Jack, Thomas, Oliver, Joshua and Harry. and Grace, Ruby, Olivia, Emily and Jessica. Once an old-fashioned name falls below a certain level of usage, perhaps, it is no longer playground-proof and parents avoid it.

But Ms Roberts, like Julia Cresswell, who is the author of several books on babies' names, thinks that all is not lost for traditional names. The wheel will turn again, they argue.

Oliver had once been a romantic name, Ms Cresswell said - but after the Restoration its associations with Cromwell made it “totally unusable, so that when Dickens was writing Oliver Twist part of the cruelty was to be called Oliver”. Last year that once-cruel name was the third most popular across England and Wales.

Ms Cresswell also cites the effect of a certain Mr Wilde's fate to illustrate the cyclical nature of naming fashions: “You couldn't call a boy Oscar in 1920 - he would have gone through hell.” In 2007 the name was trendy enough to be placed 39 on the most-used list.

Once-popular names that are in decline

Boys Norman, Walter, Percy, Harold, Ernest, Herbert, Clifford, Frank, Arnold, Leonard, Edgar, Arthur, Albert, Edwin, Alfred, Sidney, Stanley, Francis, Richard, Fred

Girls Gertrude, Edna, Ethel, Irene, Ada, Norah, Olive, Agnes, Elsie, Mabel, Edith

Source: Gurgle.com Historical Names Report

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