seven reflections
Login
Orion Name Meaning, Origins & History

Orion

Pronunciation: oh-RYE-un / uh-RYE-un

Meaning Son of fire or light Origin Ancient Greek Gender Boy
BOYS RANK
#334
TREND
9
GIRLS RANK
#6,491
TREND
2,059
Peak Years
2018, 2019, 2016
Lowest Years
1880, 1885, 1886
Energy Archetype
Patient & Strong-Willed

Rank shows the name’s position among U.S. baby names for each gender in 2025. Trend shows how many places it rose or fell since 2024. Rank 1 is the most popular. Based on U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA) data. Peak and lowest years are based on the number of boys named Orion in the available records.

Fun Facts About the Name Orion

  • More than 23 thousand babies named Orion: U.S. records list 23,740 babies given the name Orion from 1880 through 2025. Even 630 girls received the name Orion - about 1 girl for every 37 boys.

What Does the Name Orion Mean?

Orion is a name of ancient Greek origin, written Ὠρίων in Greek. Its meaning is uncertain. The Greeks themselves offered more than one explanation, and no single derivation has won general acceptance among modern scholars. The proposal most often repeated connects the name to Greek oros (ὄρος), "mountain," and the related adjective oreios (ὄρειος), "of the mountains," which would give a sense such as "mountain dweller" or "mountain man." A second proposal links the name to hōra (ὥρα), "season" or "time" - an appealing idea for a star group whose rising and setting marked the turning points of the farming year, though the sound correspondence is not exact.

Ancient writers also passed down a folk etymology deriving the name from ouron (οὖρον), "urine," because of the myth that Orion was conceived when gods urinated into a bull's hide. That is wordplay on the story, not a genuine derivation. Some modern attempts look outside Greek altogether and compare the name with older Near Eastern words associated with the constellation, but these remain suggestions. What can be said with confidence is that the name is Greek in form, whatever its ultimate root may be.

Orion Name History & Origins

In Greek myth, Orion was a giant hunter. He is usually called a son of Poseidon and, in one version, of Euryale; a separate story says he was born from a bull's hide buried in the ground by three gods. He was said to be able to walk on the sea, and he hunted with Artemis. His death is told in several ways: he was shot by Artemis, in some accounts after Apollo tricked her into it, or he was killed by a giant scorpion sent by the earth goddess Gaia. After death he was placed among the stars, where the constellation Orion carries his name, while the scorpion became Scorpius.

The constellation appears in early Greek poetry. Homer's Iliad and Odyssey mention Orion as a star group, and the Odyssey also shows him as a hunter still hunting in the underworld. Hesiod's Works and Days tells farmers to time their plowing and harvest by Orion's rising and setting. The same star group appears in the Hebrew Bible under the name Kesil, which many English translations render as "Orion" in passages in Job and Amos.

Orion was also used as a personal name in the Greek world; Orion of Thebes, a grammarian of about the fifth century AD, compiled a collection of etymologies that survives in part under his name. The name passed into Latin and then into European languages mainly by way of the constellation and the myth of the hunter, which later writers and star lore kept alive. In modern times it has been used as a masculine given name in English-speaking countries, and it also names the Orion Nebula and NASA's Orion spacecraft.

How Popular is the Name Orion?

Orion recorded its highest annual U.S. birth count in 2018. Its best rank was #300 in 2018.

U.S. name popularity from 1880-2025, based on SSA data. Rank shows how the name compares with other names - lower numbers mean greater popularity. Births shows how many babies received the name each year.

Name popularity over more than a century, based on Social Security Administration data. Gaps in the chart indicate years when the name does not appear in the published records.

Explore More Lists with Name Orion

Most Popular Boy Names That Start with O

See List of Most Popular Boy Names Starting with O

Unique Short Boy Names That Start with O

Discover Popular Boy Names Starting with O

How the Name Orion Shapes Your Personality and Life?

You are patient, persevering and strong willed. You are a good student, absorbing knowledge easily and retaining it well. You are either a saint or a sinner. You tend to hold things inside and suffer in silence. You are frank, methodical and believe in law, system and order.

Position and social status is very important for you and you are always looking for way to improve your position in society. You have power and ability to chose your own destiny and achieve anything you want in life. You can expand in any direction according to your will and the set of values. You have passion for justice and belong to the position of authority. You have an inherent courage and endurance to accomplish "The Impossible Dream". With the power comes responsibility. You hold keys to the material world, but with this gift comes high spiritual responsibility to be fair and true to others. You are philosophical and mature, determined and intense with a desire to endure, often religious.

✦ Orion's Deeper Meaning & Tips for Parents Discover Orion's symbolic numbers and practical tips for choosing a name that complements your child's birth date.
Explore Insights & Tips

Name Search