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German names
Can anyone tell me if the following names are popular in Germany? I'm looking especially for names that were popular there for girls born in the 1990s.Heidi
Philippa
Salome
Kunigunde
Karen
Meta
Liesl
Marta
Susanne
Amalie
Elisabeth
Gretel
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A question just out of curiosity: How did you come up with this list of candidates?I can confirm that the link that you got to http://www.beliebte-vornamen.de/ is good, you will probably find there what you need.
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I am trying to find names for characters of a book, and I like to pick names that sort of relate to my life. For example, I have a cousin named Amelia, so I put Amalie on the list. I don't know why I need to do it, but it somehow makes the book more personable to me.

This message was edited 7/31/2009, 12:17 PM

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Hi I'm German and I'm born in 1987. Here's what I think:Heidi - Usually a NN for Adelheid. Was not popular in the 90s.
Philippa - Has always been a rare name. Never very popular but never unheard of.
Salome - Very rare name now AND back then.
Kunigunde - A medieval name that has not been popular at any time during the 20th century.
Karen - Not popular in the 90s but the spelling Karin was quite popular one genaration before that.
Meta - Rare name.
Susanne - Popular from 1950 to 1990. Still a common name.
Amalie - AmElie was popular in the 90s, AmAlie was not. The spellings almost look alike but many Germans pronounce them quite differently! Amalie = ah-MAH-lee-ə ; Amelie = AH-me-lee or ah-me-LEE
Elisabeth - Common but not extremely popular in the 90s.
Gretel - Almost never used as a full name. It is a NN for Margarete which has not been popular since the 1950s.Since '87 isn't that far from the 90s I can give you some names of girls who are about my age. Maybe that will help you:
Johanna, Julia, Sarah, Katharina (NN: Kathi), Alexandra, Daniela (NN: Dani), Nicole, Sandra, Franziska, Miriam, Anna, Jennifer, Laura, Vanessa, Lea, Marie

This message was edited 7/30/2009, 9:39 AM

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Thank you very much, it helped me a lot! :)
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Popular in the 90s were only maybe Susanne, Karen and Elisabeth, though none of those were actually considered fashionable back then. Heidi has only recently become popular and Liesl and Gretel were never considered actual names but diminutives that haven't been in use for a hundred years or so. Kunigunde and Meta are totally outdated.Here is a link to names popular in the 90s: http://www.beliebte-vornamen.de/3778-1990er-jahre.htm.
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I'd say Karen, Susanne and Elisabeth are the most popular names on your list. Kunigunde, Liesl and Gretel sound really old-fashioned to me, and Meta I have actually never heard before.
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