Awesome German Names

Ulrike and its Anglicized form Ulrica were given to exactly zero baby girls in the US last year, while their masculine form Ulrich was used for a dozen baby boys. U is the least common first initial for baby names in the US, making Ulrike extra unique. Ulrich and variations is German and means "rich and noble heritage".

A saint's name with a noteworthy literary background, including uses by Shakespeare in Two Gentlemen of Verona and Much Ado About Nothing, by Ben Johnson, Walter Scott, Longfellow, D. H. Lawrence and Neil Gaiman. In real life, her two most well known representatives are writer Ursula Le Guin and actress Ursula Andress. In literature, there is also Ursula Iguaran, a key, long-lived character in Gabriel Garcia Marquez's major work, One Hundred Years of Solitude.

This diminutive of Valeria has a strong and striking sound to match its meaning. It has also been used in Brazil in recent decades.

Verena is pleasant but old-fashioned. Whether that's the outdated kind of old-fashioned or the so-out-it's-in-again kind is your call.

The Viktor form of this classic name is widely used throughout Europe and is rising in the US as well.