These Are The 10 Most Common Italian Last Names In NJ

You know that famous soliloquy from Romeo and Juliet, “what’s in a name"? That part of the play is trying to convince us that the meaning of a name is irrelevant. Well, tell that to my Italian grandmother. She had such pride in the last name Calabrese, which literally means from Calabria.

Did you know that there are currently approximately 1.25 million Italian people living in New Jersey? We really should just call the state Little Italy. I was wondering what the most common Italian names were and what they meant. Here are the top 10 most common Italian names, number one being one that I’m pretty familiar with!...

10
Greco
Oddly enough the meaning of this Italian name is "Greek"
9
Gallo
Gallo means rooster
8
Rizzo
Rizzo means someone with curly hair, shouldn't that be Frizzo?
7
Caruso
Caruso's meaning is boy or lad
6
Esposito
Esposito translates to be exposed to the outdoors
5
Bruno
Bruno stands for armour of protection
4
Rossi
Rossi stands for red-haired but I don't know a lot of redhead Italians do you?
3
Romano
Romano means citizen of Rome which is pretty straight forward
2
Marino
Marino means of the sea which is super-cool
1
Russo
Russo also stands for red hair or beard, Russo is a version of Rossi so that makes sense

It is on my wishlist to go to Calabria one day to see the village my grandmother and great-grandfather came from! I'm also of Irish descent, and I did have the chance to go there. In County Cork, Ireland, we saw the last name "Holly" on grocery store signs and on headstones in graveyards. It is so cool to see where you come from! So to answer that age-old question, I think there is a lot in a name.

You could learn more about this and the Italian regions here.

These are the most popular first names in New Jersey.

Top 20 Baby Names in New Jersey

Every year we find out the top baby names in each state. Here are the top ten names for boys and girls in the state of New Jersey. I don't know about you, but number one, for both, is really good.

What are the most popular first names in history? Over the past 100 years, the trends have totally changed.