Shimei
given name · Latin script
Meaning: Shimei's compliance with Ezra's directive to divorce his foreign wife represents an act of communal repentance and a commitment to covenantal purity
Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/ʃimaɪ/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Shimei is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in China than in any other country.
- CNChina≈1 in 194K(inferred from the name graph)
- TWTaiwan≈1 in 358K
- HKHong Kong≈1 in 405K
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- China (inferred from the name graph)
- Sources
- 52 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 194K (inferred from the name graph)
≈7,200 people, est.
Highest-authority source
China, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
One other spelling is counted as the same name:
Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records, and ○ marks a model's transliteration; click a spelling to open its page.
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
Shimei's compliance with Ezra's directive to divorce his foreign wife represents an act of communal repentance and a commitment to covenantal purity. His story is part of a larger narrative emphasizing the importance of maintaining religious and cultural distinctiveness for the post-exilic Jewish community, viewing intermarriage as a threat to the nation's relationship with God.
Sources 1
- Biblical Names Compiled Database
Attested across 19 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Shimei 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 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CN China | ≈7,200 est. | ≈1 in 194K | — | Shimei | 35 |
| TW Taiwan | ≈66 est. | ≈1 in 358K | — | Shimei | 8 |
| PH Philippines | ≈56 est. | ≈1 in 2M | — | Shimei | 10 |
| US United States | ≈55 est. | ≈1 in 6M | listed | Shimei | 52 |
| MY Malaysia | ≈37 est. | ≈1 in 872K | — | Shimei | 5 |
| HK Hong Kong | ≈18 est. | ≈1 in 405K | — | Shimei | 3 |
| SG Singapore | ≈15 est. | ≈1 in 417K | — | Shimei | 8 |
| DK Denmark | 3 | 1 in 2M | 3 | — | — |
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: Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts). 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)
Shimei 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.
As the progenitor of the Shimeite clan, Shimei is part of the lineage of Levites set apart for religious duties concerning the tabernacle. His family line is specifically included in Zechariah's prophecy of Israel's future repentance and mourning, signifying their integral role within the tribe of Levi and the broader community of Israel.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
The name Shimei is derived from the Hebrew verb 'shama', meaning 'to hear' or 'to listen'. It is generally understood to mean 'renowned', 'famous', or 'my fame', and is likely a shortened form of the name Shemaiah, which means 'Yahweh has heard'.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
The name Shimei is a Hebrew name meaning "renowned" or "famous." In the Bible, it is the name of several individuals, including one who, out of faithfulness to his community's renewal, made the difficult decision to follow religious reforms.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
The name Shimei is derived from the Hebrew root 'shama' (שָׁמַע), meaning "to hear" or "to listen". Its meaning is commonly interpreted as "my listening," "my fame," "renowned," or as a shortened form of Shemaiah, meaning "Yahweh has heard."
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
The name Shimei comes from the Hebrew root 'shama', meaning 'to hear' or 'to listen', and can be interpreted as 'my listening', 'famous', or 'renowned'. It is likely a shortened form of the name Shemaiah, which means 'Yahweh has heard'.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
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.
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 5 sources across 4 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DK Denmark | Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts) | — | 3 | #16,634 |
Reference works 1
- Wikipedia surname tokens
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 Shimei mean, and where does it come from?
- Shimei's compliance with Ezra's directive to divorce his foreign wife represents an act of communal repentance and a commitment to covenantal purity. Recorded by Biblical Names Compiled Database.
- How do you pronounce Shimei?
- A machine transcription gives /ʃimaɪ/ (IPA) for English.
- Is Shimei a male or female name?
- Shimei is a female 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.
- What are other forms of the name Shimei?
- In the etymology graph, Simon, Simeon and Szymon are forms of the same name in other languages.
- In which country does Shimei have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 7.2 thousand people named Shimei in China, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled shimei.
- How common is the name Shimei?
- In Denmark, the national register counted 3 people named Shimei, about 1 in 2.0 million residents.
What do you want to know about Shimei?
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/shimeiThe 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, “Shimei”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.