Yaakov

Where Yaakov comes from

Yaakov hasn't made it into the dictionaries we draw on, and nobody well known enough for an encyclopedia has carried it yet — so for now its story is the one the SSA record tells. Names that spell a familiar sound a new way often live here for a while before anyone writes them down.

Along the way
  1. 1935
    Yaakov Turner born
    Israeli general
  2. 1948
    First appearance
    #3,316 among boys, 6 babies — the first year at least five got the name.
  3. 1964
    Yaakov Shabtai born
    former commander of Israel Police
  4. 1986
    Peak, #848
    114 babies named Yaakov — more than any year before or since.
  5. 1993
    The fade
    The first year with half the peak's births — down to #1,601.
In the dictionary

No dictionary entry for this spelling — which is its own kind of rare.

Namesakes
  • Yaakov Shabtai · former commander of Israel Police, born 1964
  • Yaakov Turner · Israeli general, 1935–2024
  • Yaakov Shabtai · Israeli writer, 1934–1981
  • Yaakov Yisrael Kanievsky · Israeli rabbi, 1899–1985
  • Yaakov Aryeh Alter · Rebbe of the Ger Hasidic dynasty, born 1939

Sources: the origin note and dictionary entry are quoted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0); the namesakes come from Wikidata (CC0); the milestones are worked out from the SSA record.