Alexander or Donald?

I had recently come across a line in a novel that said that in Scotland (in the mid-18th century) every man's name was either Alexander or Donald. While that's obviously an exaggeration, it got me thinking, and I decided to see just how popular those names were within the context of Scottish settlement in Upper Canada.


Five most popular names for listed
male settlers 1790-1849

Looking at the 15 extant passenger lists of ships departing from Scotland to Quebec (between 1790-1849 with settlers intended on travelling through to Upper Canada), I was able to distinguish 1,153 male names (Campey). These names are mostly the heads of families; children's names were rarely provided. In some instances not every man travelling aboard a vessel was accounted for by name, however, the five most popular names listed are:

1. John (261 individuals)
2. Donald (101)
3. Alexander (100)
4. William (93)
5. Duncan (59)

The next most popular names were Robert (54), Archibald (40), Angus (28), Allan and Andrew (each with 16), and Dougald (7). So it would seem that this novel wasn't too far off the mark. As you can see from the donut graph here, the top five names cover just more than half of the total, and if you were a listed male passenger aboard one of these ships, there was a nearly one in four chance that your name was John. As for modern day, the five most popular names for boys in Ontario between the years 1917-2010 were 1. Joseph, 2. John, 3. William, 4. Robert, and 5. James. Looks like in about 200 years of settlement we haven't strayed too far from the mark.


Five most popular names for listed
female settlers 1790-1849

For those interested in the most popular names for the ladies aboard the same ships, it's "Mrs." and "Wife of". All jokes aside, I was able to find 533 listed female passengers, and the most popular recorded names are:

1. Mary (86 individuals)
2. Catherine (80)
3. Janet (57)
4. Anne (46)
5. Margaret (45)

The next most popular names to round off the top ten were Isobel/la (23), Marion and Flora (each with 19), Elizabeth (17), and Euphemia (8). In modern day Ontario between the years 1917-2010, the most popular girls names were 1. Mary, 2. Marie, 3. Jennifer, 4. Margaret, and 5. Patricia.

Sources

Lucille H. Campey's 2005 The Scottish Pioneers of Upper Canada, 1784-1855: Glengarry and Beyond

Global Toronto, 2012, "Interactive: 93 Years of Ontario Baby Names"

Further Reading
Behind the Name, "Scottish Names" Here you can learn a little more about the Gaelic roots to many of the names mentioned above. For example, "Duncan: Anglicized form of the Gaelic name Donnchadh meaning "brown warrior", derived from Gaelic donn "brown" and cath "warrior". This was the name of two kings of Scotland, including the one who was featured in Shakespeare's play 'Macbeth' (1606).