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Bailey - Meaning of Bailey
What does Bailey mean?
[ 2 syll. bai-ley, ba-il-ey ] The baby girl name Bailey is also used as a boy name, though it is far more popular for girls. It is pronounced BEY-Liy- †. Bailey is of Old English origin and it is used mainly in English. The name Bailey means 'bailiff; berry wood'. It is derived from baili meaning 'bailiff' ; baiulus 'porter, messenger' ; beg 'berry' ; leah 'wood, clearing, meadow'. It represents the transferred use of the job title and the surname as a given name. See Bailey for more information.
Bailey has 26 forms. Forms of the name include Baeli, Bail, Bailea, Baileah, Bailei, Baili, Bali, Balley, Bayla, Bayle, Baylea, Bayleah, Bayleigh, Bayley, and Bayli. Other English forms include the spelling variants Bailee, Baileigh, Bailie, Bailley, Baillie, Bailly, Baily, Baleigh, Baylee, Baylie, and Bayly.
See also the related categories, wood (forest), messenger, berry, and meadow.
Bailey is popular as a baby girl name. The name increased in popularity from the 1980s up to the 1990s; prior to that, it was of only very light use. At the modest peak of its usage in 1998, 0.268% of baby girls were named Bailey. It had a ranking of #60 then. The baby name has experienced a drop in frequency since then. In 2018, it ranked at #133 with a usage of 0.117%, but it was nevertheless the most popular out of all girl names in its family. Bailey was 4 times more widely used than the 2nd most popular name, Baylee, in 2018. Although Bailey is today more frequently used for baby girls, there was a period prior to 1937 when more boys were given the name. After 1983, increasingly the name became more popular with baby girls than with boys. There were 19 times more baby girls than boys who were named Bailey in 2010.
Baby names that sound like Bailey include Bailea, Bailee, Baileigh, Baili, Bailie, Bailley, Baillie, Bailly, Baily, Baleigh, Baylee, Bayley, Bayli, Baylie, Bayly, Bailei, Bala, Bali, Balley, and Bela.
† Pronunciation for Bailey: B as in "be (B.IY)" ; EY as in "ate (EY.T)" ; L as in "lay (L.EY)" ; IY as in "eat (IY.T)"
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