Scarlett
When Margaret Mitchell started writing her bestselling novel, Gone with the Wind, she named her hero Pansy. However, the book publishers suggested she use a more dramatic name. Thus, Mitchell changed her character's name to Scarlett. Where did that come from, though?
According to Nancy's Baby Names, Mitchell often came across the name Katie Scarlett in Irish Literature. This being said, Scarlett O'Hara's first name was Katie. Scarlett got her middle name from her grandmother's maiden name. She was just always known as Scarlett, though. Mitchell explained it in her novel, but it's easy to miss that in the movie. Thus, parents who only saw the movie might misread Scarlett as a common Victorian name.
As hinted above, Scarlett began as a surname. However, it doesn't sound like one because it's merely a respelling of the color. Scarlet cloth wasn't always exclusively red, though. In the late Middle Ages, two centuries after Scarlett became a surname for makers of the cloth, scarlet became a term for its common red color.
Despite Scarlett's origin as a surname, it wasn't completely new when Gone with the Wind was published. According to Elea on British Baby Names, Scarlet(t) entered sparing use as a unisex name in the seventeenth century. It only became completely feminine when Margaret Mitchell's novel came out. Scarlett debuted in American naming data in 1937, the year after the publication of Gone with the Wind. Three years later, after the movie adaptation starring Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara premiered, Scarlett entered the top 1000. It only ranked for four years, though.
Since scarlet was historically a symbolic color for sin, as in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, 1940s parents weren't fully ready for the name. Pop culture didn't affect names as much back then as it does today, either.
Nonetheless, Scarlett has never dropped out of use since its 1937 debut. Perhaps it re-entered the top 1000 in the early 1960s. It could have to do with the twenty-fifth anniversary of the book's publication. Or else, there was the 1961 political comedy One, Two, Three, which featured a character named Scarlett Hazeltine. Since Scarlett re-entered the top 1000 the year after the comedy came out, I think One, Two, Three had a larger impact than the anniversary of Gone with the Wind. Since it left the top 1000 again in 1964, parents were still not quite ready for the name.
Twenty-eight years later, Scarlett returned to the top 1000 to stay. The year before its resurgence, Alexandra Ripley wrote Scarlett, a sequel to Gone with the Wind. Because Scarlett never left the top 1000 again, it was clear parents were finally ready to keep using the dangerous name. Yet, Scarlett still clung to the fringes of the charts.
The dawn of the twenty-first century marked a significant change for Scarlett. Scarlett Johansson had a breakout year in 2003, when she starred in the famous films Lost in Translation and Girl with a Pearl Earring. The next year, Scarlett, which was already rising elsewhere in the English-speaking world, entered the Australian and British top 100. Scarlett subsequently began its quick rise in the United States. By the time it entered the top 100 in 2011, Scarlett was officially popular throughout the English-speaking world. From 2016 through 2018, Scarlett was a top 20 hit. Even today, it remains inside the top 25.
Scarlett still has some issues regardless of its success, though. First, because it rose so dramatically in use, Scarlett feels slightly trendy. In addition, it is not quite clear whether Scarlett counts as traditional or contemporary. Those who consider a traditional name to have been in use for at least a century might call it a trendy surname. However, traditionalists who appreciate any name that reminds them of the past would accept Scarlett, even if it wasn't O'Hara's first name.
Because of its modest history of use, I think it falls in between traditional and contemporary names. Yet, the name is definitely cool, colorful, dangerous, exotic, literary, southern, and strong.
SPELLINGS:
Scarlet, Scarlette
STYLES:
SISTERS:
BROTHERS:
Jude, Atticus, Wyatt, Sawyer, Dashiell, Levi, Romeo, Holden
ALTERNATIVES:
Cosette, Darcy, Garnet, Saffron, Scout, Sonnet, Tempest, Velvet
FURTHER RESOURCES:
Nickerson, Eleanor. "Scarlett." Names of the Week, British Baby Names, 25 Mar. 2017, https://www.britishbabynames.com/blog/2017/03/scarlett.html.
Sandel, Abby. "Scarlett: Baby Name of the Day." Appellation Mountain, 10 Apr. 2019, https://appellationmountain.net/baby-name-of-the-day-scarlett/.
"Scarlett." Names, Behind the Name, 9 Jun. 2023, https://www.behindthename.com/name/scarlett.
"What popularized the baby name Scarlett?" Name Blog, Nancy's Baby Names, 29 Feb. 2012, https://www.nancy.cc/2012/02/29/baby-name-scarlett/.
What do you think about Scarlett? Do you consider it traditional or contemporary?
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