(male) Biblical name, borne by the greatest of all the kings of Israel, whose history is recounted with great vividness in the first and second books of Samuel and elsewhere. As a boy he killed the giant Philistine Goliath with his slingshot. As king of Judah, and later of all Israel, he expanded the power of the Israelites and established the security of their kingdom. He was also noted as a poet, many of the Psalms being attributed to him. The Hebrew derivation of the name is uncertain; it is said by some to represent a nursery word meaning ‘darling’. It is a very popular Jewish name, but is almost equally common among Gentiles in the English-speaking world. It is particularly common in Wales and Scotland, having been borne by the patron saint of Wales (see Dewi) and by two medieval kings of Scotland.
Short form: Dave.
Pet forms: Davy, Davey, Davie (mainly Scottish); Dai.
Cognates: Irish: Dáibhídh. Scottish Gaelic: Dàibhidh. Welsh: Dafydd, Dewi. German, Dutch: David. French: David. Spanish: David. Italian: Davide. Russian: David. Polish: Dawid. Czech: David. Finnish: Taavi. Hungarian: Dávid.
French: from a pet name derived from the personal name Babylas; it was the name of patriarch of Antioch who was beatified in the 3rd century.
Jewish (from Belarus): metronymic from the personal name Babe.
Jewish (from Belarus): habitational name from Babino, a village in Belarus.
Russian, Ukrainian, and Polish (Babyn): metronymic or patronymic from baba ‘grandmother’, ‘old woman’, either meaning son of an old woman or a nickname denoting a fussy man.
Serbian: nickname from baba ‘grandmother’ or babo ‘father’.
FOREBEARS A bearer of the name Babin from the Poitou region of France was documented in Montreal in 1691, with the secondary surname Lacroix. A secondary surname of Lasource is documented with a family from the Maine region.Most Louisiana families bearing this name descend from Acadian refugees who first settled in MD after the expulsion of 1755.
