Baby Name of the Day: Django

The baby name Django has come thisclose to catching on, but remains quite rare.

Thanks to Marilee for suggesting our Baby Name of the Day.

IT STARTS WITH DJANGO REINHARDT

What does the baby name Django mean? 

Django Reinhardt was born in Belgium to a Romani family – at the time, others would’ve called them gypsies.

His given name was Jeanor maybe Jean-Baptiste, like his violin-playing father, but somewhere along the way he picked up the nickname Django – “I awake” in Romani. 

Or so they say. Romani isn’t one unified language – it is multiple dialects or perhaps even several closely related languages. The alphabet wasn’t standardized until 1990 – many years after Reinhardt’s 1910 birth.

Also possible: Django might come from an older form of John.

Stay with me here.

The Walloon language is a cousin to French, spoken in parts of France, Belgium, Brussels, Luxembourg, and thanks to immigrants, parts of Wisconsin. 

Names beginning with DJ are mainstream in Walloon, including Djan for Jean and Djåcob for Jacob.

So is it Roma or Walloon? Probably a little bit of both, a compelling mix of two traditions. 

Django Reinhardt would make his nickname famous.

Reinhardt was always musically inclined, and his instrument of choice was the guitar. He was already earning a living as a musician when a fire left him badly injured, paralyzing two of his fingers. His greatest achievements came after the tragedy, as he learned a new style of playing, discovered American jazz, and formed Quintette du Hot Club de France with violinist StephaneGrappelli. Even today his work – like the zippy “Daphne”– sounds fresh and distinctive.

Reinhardt isn’t quite as well know as Louis Armstrong or Duke Ellington, but his reputation has grown in recent years. His music appears in several Woody Allen films, most notably Sweet and Lowdown. He makes a cameo in 2011’s Hugo, too.

In 2017, a French biopic titled Django was released.

FROM PARIS TO THE WILD WEST

In 1966, Italian actor FrancoNero played a gold-stealing bandit in a hyper-violent Western. 

The film and the character were both called Django. Sequels and spin-offs kept the character alive into the 1980s. 

Here’s the thing: the name Django probably didn’t exist in the nineteenth century. At least, it wouldn’t have belonged to a Union solider who fought in the Civil War. 

Instead, the filmmakers chose the name as a deliberate reference to the musician. (Spoiler alert.) The character’s hands are crushed near the end of the first movie, but he manages to defeat his enemies despite his injury. 

The popularity of Django led to dozens of spin-offs. It kick-started an entire genre, many of them using the name Django, too. 

More on this in a minute, because the Wild West connection doesn’t end in the twentieth century. 

JANGO 

Drop the D, and Jango is still an unlikely given name. 

But a list of characters have answered to this spelling of the name, too.

• First up: a real-life Jango. João Goulart served as president of Brazil in the 1960s. João, like Djan, is one more form of John. While Jango could come from the politician’s first name/surname initial, apparently Jango was in use as a nickname for João at the time in Brazilian Portuguese. 
• In the extended Star Wars universe, Jango Fett is the bounty hunter father of Boba Fett. We eventually find out that Jango is incredibly significant in the arc of the story. 
• Born in Detroit, Stanley Edwards adopted the stage name Jango and moved to Europe where he became a famous counter-culture figure and clown. 

A handful of Djangos are heard, too, including an animated rat in Ratatouille, a minor character in Phineas and Ferb, and a few video game and manga figures. 

The Phineas and Ferb character was named for Django Marsh, son of the series’ co-creator, Jeff Marsh. 

Actors Nana Visitor and Alexander Siggid named their son Django, too. He’s has small roles in everything from Peaky Blinders to Game of Thrones to The Bad Batch. He and Nana were working on Deep Space Nine during her pregnancy it was written into the storyline.

British musician Django Bates – born Leon – had adopted the name by the 1970s.

THE RETURN OF THE WESTERN

There are uses of the name Django across other categories: restaurants and clubs, software, a streaming radio platform.

But it’s Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained that gave this name a major pop culture boost.

The film Django Unchainedisn’t a sequel. Instead, it borrows the name as an homage to the genre. 

Jamie Foxx played the title role. It’s a brutal story of slavery, and a man fighting to find his wife.

That was in 2012.

In 2023, a television series titled Django, based more closely on the original 1966 movie, debuted in Europe. This story, too, involved the title character looking for his family. (This time it’s a daugther, Sarah, and we learn that Django’s real name is Julian.)

HOW POPULAR IS THE NAME DJANGO?

The twenty-first century seems like a good moment for unusual names. We love a good boy’s name ending in O, too. If Arlo and Leo can be mainstream favorites, why couldn’t Django trend, too?

In fact, the baby name Django debuted in US popularity data way back in 1970. But it didn’t really gain momentum until the year 2000. After that, Django is given to at least five boys most years right up through today.

It peaked in 2011, with word of Quentin Tarantino’s film creating plenty of buzz. That year, 28 boys were named Django.

As of 2023, just five boys were named Django. 

Interestingly, Jango has neer registered in US data, meaning that it’s never been given to even five boys born in a single year.

RARE, MUSICAL, BOLD

You’re not likely to hear Django on the playground.

If anything, this name still feels like the province of celebrities or influencers. It’s a big choice, bold and surprising.

Some might try to group it with boy names from the Bible, insisting that it’s a form of John. Maybe.  But choosing this name seems to require accepting both its Romani origin and musical heritage.

Should that appeal to you, then Django is the kind of surprising choice that might raise an eyebrow or two when you introduce your kid. But ultimately? This could wear very well indeed in our Margot/Thiago moment. 

That is, if you don’t mind repeating “the D is silent” again and again. 

What do you think of the baby name Django?

First published on June 25, 2012, this post was revised and re-published on February 10, 2025.