How many unique names are there in UK?

[Janelle]

Rarest Surname from my tree that registers an answer on that database is EDBROOK Count= 50 Ranking = 50807, add E to the end and the count is another 259.

And his wife, surname HOUNDEL isn't found on that database, but that might be me not knowing any current variation.

Mind you they were Exmoor folks b 1630's (Withypool and Exford and possibly West Anstey) ... William and Richord (weird enough), who went on to name one son Silvester, and for that combination there are 4 baptisms in Exford during 1654 to 1709.

[locksmith]

I am unique, as was my Dad, my granddad, great granddad and great great granddad. No peculiar forenames all fairly widespread. But with a rare surname (about 70 of us in the UK) maybe its not surprising.
Are the five unique generations unique?

Simon

[ScouseBoy]

I think my dad had a unique name, although  his first and last names were both quite common, he had a very unusual middle name.    His middle name was pretty near being rare back in 1850,  but then an ancestor who could not read nor write  must have pronounced his name in a broad rural accent  and consequently his surname got mis-translated  into something even more rare.

[mumjo]

both my maiden name and married name are quite high in the rankings. My daughters married name gives 5 people with that surname all of which must be her hubby's close relatives.

[coombs]

My 2xgreat gran was called Gertrude Georgeanna Wallaker. The only person ever to have lived with that name. In 1871 she was mistranscribed as Jarichnaeade Wallaker.

[Erato]

Back to the original question ...

One could roughly estimate the number of unique names that exist in a given population by employing a variant of the technique that biologists call 'capture/recapture.'  This is a methodology used to estimate the population size of wild animals.  It could be done for England if a large unbiased sample [say, 3000] of English RootsChatters declared whether their own name is unique or not.

# unique names in England/total English population  =  # unique names in RChatter sample/# RChatters sampled

[Cell]

Perhaps what I should have said,  to clarify my question,  "Are there any combination of names, including a middle name)    which are unique?

Some surnames may be dying out, of course.

I think that my mother has the only one combination of all her names in the world (she has four in total) with a google in "    " her full name doesn't bring up anyone. She was given a male  family member's Christian name  and  a family maiden name hyphenated together

same family again -My Aunt , mum's sister, has a totally unique Christian name , my gran named her after two Irish nuns  that were kind to her when she was in trouble ( my gran was Presbyterian so it's not the norm for my gran to name children after nuns). She combined the two Irish names of these  kind nuns together to form one. Most people ask my aunt about her name, it's a really odd name and there is no-one in the  available online  Bmd's that have her Christian name . I doubt that there s anyone in the world with the name but her  as it is a totally made up  nonsensical name to others. Google throws up nothing, doesn't recognise it.

My own full name is not too common   name or rare a  name, there are a lucky handful of us about in the UK , but not out here in Aus as far as I know- thank goodness as I wouldn't want to be bumping into myself all  of the time, we'd spend far too much time chatting!

[Seaton Smithy]

Let's not forget Dweezil and Moon Unit Zappa......

Few people forget Dweezil and Moon Unit ... people are more likely to forget their lesser known siblings Ahmet and Diva.

Another unique name combination people often forget is Duncan Zowie Heywood Jones - possibly because most people think his name is something else.

[Guy Etchells]

If you include middle names, how many unique names do you think there may be?

That is easy to answer.
The same number as the number of words in the world multiplied by the number of possible combinations of those words, plus any spelling variation of the above.

Why?
Because these days any word can be used as a name.

Cheers
Guy