Both, Boy Names, Girl Names baby nameDylan

What does the name Dylan mean?

The different meanings of the name Dylan are:
  • American meaning: Son of the sea
  • Celtic - Gaelic meaning: Son of the sea
  • Welsh meaning: Man from the sea
The meaning of the name “Dylan” is different in several languages, countries and cultures and has more than one possibly same or different meanings available.

Additional information: Dylan is a male name of Welsh origin; from the Welsh dy (great) and llanw (tide), it was the name of a figure in Welsh mythology, Dylan ail Don, a god of the sea and the son of Gwyddion and Arianrhod. He was accidentally killed by his uncle, a Smith God called Govannon. Alternative spellings include Dillan, Dylin, and Dillon, and although it doesn’t have any foreign spelling variants, diminutives for Dylan include Dy and Dyl. Other names that have a similar meaning to Dylan include Dorian (From The Sea), Murray (From the Sea Town), and Ronan (Little Seal). As Dylan can be used as a gender neutral name, it doesn’t have any feminine variants; it is, however, more commonly associated with being a masculine name. Dylan is commonly misspelled as ‘Dyaln’, ‘Dlyan’, and ‘Dilan’.

The name Dylan only entered the top thousand names for boys in the USA in 1966, but soon climbed through the rankings, reaching its peak in 2003 to 2004 at 19th. It decreased slightly in popularity in the following years, but not substantially – it was the 29th most popular name for boys in 2014. Dylan is currently in the middle of a similar popularity increase as a feminine name – it went from 882nd in 2002 to 394th in 2014. Part of the reason Dylan is so popular in England and Wales is because of its popularity in Wales – it was the most popular name in 2010 in Wales. Combined with the figures for England, Dylan has been in the top fifty names for boys since 1998, and was 34th in 2014.

Famous people with the name include the late Welsh poet Dylan Thomas, Dylan O’Brien (American actor) and the American musician Bob Dylan, whose real name is Robert Zimmerman, who adopted his stage surname from the poet's name. Due to these people, use of the name has spread outside of Wales in the last half of the 20th century. It received a further boost in popularity in the 1990s because of a character on the television series 'Beverly Hills 90210'. Other popular celebs with the name are songwriter and singer Jakob Dylan, actor Dylan McDermott, pop singer Dylan Holland, movie actor Dylan Sprayberry to name a few.

Urban legends sprung up after Bob Dylan’s motorcycle crash in the sixties; people theorised that, when he came back into the public eye, he wasn’t Bob Dylan at all, but an imposter, and that the real Bob Dylan was either dead or in rehab for drug addiction. Bob Dylan & Neil Diamond encounter at The Last Waltz is an urban legend featuring the trendy name.

This name has many variations and alternate spellings, some of which are Dylane, Dylin, Dylana, Dylann, Dylen, Dylaan, Dylanee, Dylanie, Dyllan, Dylynn, Dillon, Dillan, Dyllon, Dylon, DillanDillan, Dillyn, Dyllan.