I was walking down the street recently when something happened that hasn’t happened to me for at least 30 years. I heard a woman, at the end of her tether, yelling at her young son to stop misbehaving. “Mark!” she said. “Stop it now!” It wasn’t the mother shouting at her son that was surprising – although 30 years ago the shout might have come with a clout – it was the fact that she’d said ‘Mark’. I didn’t know children called Mark still existed.

The truth is they do but they’re rare. The National Records of Scotland released their latest figures on popular names for babies this week and they show that the top five for boys are Noah, Luca, Rory, Muhammad and Oliver (the top five for girls are Freya, Isla, Olivia, Amelia and Grace). The records also show how things have changed since the 70s, with some names that were popular 50 years ago, including mine, almost disappearing. In 1974, 1,234 baby boys were named Mark. By 1994, it was just 484 and last year it was 22. Other names that filled the classrooms and playgrounds in the 70s, like Garry, Stephen, Fiona and Elaine, are in an even worse state and in danger of disappearing altogether.

Some of it is understandable: fashions change and people sometimes choose from a movie or TV show they like, hence Luca for boys (Disney) and Daphne and Penelope for girls (Bridgerton). There are plenty of one-off names on the list too, although the National Records won’t tell us what they are which may be just as well as the desire to give a child a unique name doesn’t always end well, as Jermajesty Jackson or Moon Unit Zappa will tell you. I did think, looking at the list, that the decline of Mark, Matthew and so on was probably the result of the decline of the Bible as a cultural influence, but you’ve got Noah coming in at number one and Elijah in the top 100 so what do I know.

Having........

© Herald Scotland