Ahab
given name · Latin script
Meaning: The name is rarely used in modern times due to the negative biblical portrayal of the king, though it is culturally recognized via the character Captain Ahab in Herman Melville's 'Moby-Dick'
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/eɪhæb/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Ahab is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Pakistan than in any other country.
- ILIsrael≈1 in 204K(inferred from the name graph)
- PKPakistan≈1 in 527K
- EGEgypt≈1 in 563K
carrying the name, as Mondonomo estimates it from our sources: no national register counts it in these countries. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- Pakistan (inferred from the name graph)
- Sources
- 42 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 204K (inferred from the name graph)
≈440 people, est.
Highest-authority source
Israel, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
The name is rarely used in modern times due to the negative biblical portrayal of the king, though it is culturally recognized via the character Captain Ahab in Herman Melville's 'Moby-Dick'.
Sources 1
- Biblical Names Compiled Database
Where in the world(measured from records)
Ahab counted together with the spellings and other-language forms grouped with it. Where a register counted another spelling, the row names it.
Sorted by bearers: national registers' counts, and Mondonomo's estimates (≈, est.) where no register counts.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PK Pakistan | ≈440 est. | ≈1 in 527K | listed | Ahab | 13 |
| EG Egypt | ≈190 est. | ≈1 in 563K | — | Ahab | 19 |
| US United States | ≈79 est. | ≈1 in 4.2M | listed | Ahab | 42 |
| IL Israel | ≈43 est. | ≈1 in 204K | — | Ahab | 4 |
| SA Saudi Arabia | ≈37 est. | ≈1 in 933K | — | Ahab | 7 |
| SY Syria | ≈21 est. | ≈1 in 937K | — | Ahab | 5 |
Exact figures are national registers' own counts, while figures marked ≈ and est. are Mondonomo’s estimates, counted from our sources and calibrated against those registers; hover one for how far to trust it in that country. A dash means neither exists.
Registers cited: the pk-muslim-names-cc0 register. Figures without a register are Mondonomo estimates; see Methodology.
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).
Other recorded senses(measured from records)
Ahab is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
The Hebrew name Ahab (אַחְאָב) is generally understood to mean "father's brother" or "uncle," as a combination of the words 'ah' (brother) and 'av' (father).
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
In Jewish and Christian tradition, Ahab son of Kolaiah serves as an archetype of a false prophet, representing divine judgment against those who misuse God's name and lead people astray through lies and immoral behavior. His story is a cautionary tale about the dangers of false prophecy and the importance of discerning God's true word.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
In biblical theology, Ahab serves as the archetype of the apostate king who leads Israel into sin through foreign alliance and idolatry, acting as the primary antagonist to the prophetic ministry of Elijah.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
Due to the character's profoundly negative biblical portrayal as a false prophet condemned for wickedness and adultery, the name Ahab is not typically used and carries strong negative connotations.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
In English, A king of Israel, mentioned in the Bible.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- Ahabb. 918JOKing of Israel, the son and successor of Omri, and the husband of Jezebel (1 Kings 16)
The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).
How to address them(machine-generated)
A formal English salutation is built on the surname, so it needs a full name — on its own, a first name only supports the informal form.
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 9 sources across 7 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PK Pakistan | Muslim given names (CC0) | — | — | — |
Reference works 1
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- What does the name Ahab mean, and where does it come from?
- The name is rarely used in modern times due to the negative biblical portrayal of the king, though it is culturally recognized via the character Captain Ahab in Herman Melville's 'Moby-Dick'. Recorded by Biblical Names Compiled Database.
- How common is the name Ahab?
- Mondonomo estimates about 440 people in Pakistan have Ahab as their first given name, about 1 in 527 thousand residents. No national register counts it there; the figure is ours, calibrated against the registers that do.
- How do you pronounce Ahab?
- A machine transcription gives /eɪhæb/ (IPA) for Hindi.
- Is Ahab a male or female name?
- Ahab is a male name in our records. Opposite-gender entries fall within the cross-gender noise we measure in the source data, so we don't report them as usage.
- In which country does Ahab have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 443 people named Ahab in Pakistan, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled ahab.
What do you want to know about Ahab?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/ahabThe payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. It takes a free API key (1,000 requests a day), which returns what this page shows everyone; the full country table, every register citation and the year-by-year series come with a licensed key, as does bulk access.
About this data
measured from records inferred from the name graph machine-generated
These figures come from the data snapshot of and will change as it is rebuilt.
Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.
Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.
Cite this page Mondonomo, “Ahab”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.