Yegor

Yegor is George grown country-strong, the folk-Russian branch of the same Greek root georgos, "farmer, earth-worker." Where Georgy keeps a courtly bow, Yegor rolls up its sleeves, the name of village elders, rock musicians, and the punk-poet Yegor Letov. Two syllables with a soft yeh and a firm final r, it sounds both old and strikingly current. The name has been rising steadily in twenty-first-century Russia, now solidly in the top ranks for newborn boys. Almost unknown in English-speaking countries, it offers a gutsier, more rural alternative to its fancier siblings, with real contemporary traction.