Type a name to see the earliest book of the King James Bible it appears in and the period that book narrates. 455 names are dated this way, across nine periods from the patriarchs (c. 2100 BC) to the early church (c. AD 95).
Devourer of the people; Lord of the people · Hebrew
Balaam first appears in the book of Numbers, which narrates exodus and the law (c. 1450–1400 BC). The first reference we list is Numbers 22:28.
Israel leaves Egypt and receives the Law. Names here carry deliverance and priesthood — Moses, Aaron, Miriam, Joshua, Caleb — and many show Egyptian as well as Hebrew roots.
Balaam never reached the US top 1,000 in any year from 1880 to 2008, so there is no modern usage chart for it.
Each period below is dated by the events the books narrate. Names are listed under the earliest book they occur in, so a name that runs through the whole Bible appears once, at its first entrance.
The oldest layer of biblical naming: Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob and their households. Names from this period are almost all Hebrew sentence-names about God, laughter, struggle, or promise.
Israel leaves Egypt and receives the Law. Names here carry deliverance and priesthood — Moses, Aaron, Miriam, Joshua, Caleb — and many show Egyptian as well as Hebrew roots.
Settlement in Canaan and the cycle of the judges. Names of tribal leaders, rescuers and ordinary families appear, including the first prominent Moabite name in Israel's line, Ruth.
Saul, David, Solomon and the kings that followed. This is the richest naming period in the Old Testament, and the source of most names still used today — David, Jonathan, Hannah, Samuel, Abigail, Josiah.
Warning, exile and hope. Prophetic books give us Isaiah, Jeremiah, Micah, Amos, Hosea and Malachi — names built almost entirely around statements about the LORD.
Captivity in Babylon and the rebuilding of Jerusalem. Persian and Babylonian names enter the record beside Hebrew ones — Esther, Mordecai, Ezra, Nehemiah.
Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and the Song. Fewer new names, but these books are where many name meanings are anchored, because they define the words the names are built from.
The life of Christ. Greek and Aramaic forms of older Hebrew names dominate — Jesus (Yeshua), Mary (Miriam), James (Jacob), John (Yochanan) — and these are the forms that reached Europe.
The church spreads across the Roman world, and so do its names. Greek and Latin names sit beside Hebrew ones for the first time: Stephen, Timothy, Priscilla, Lydia, Paul, Silas.
Scriptural first appearances come from the King James Version. Modern usage figures come from US Social Security Administration national baby-name records, 1880-2008.