Garou
surname · Latin script
Meaning: werewolf
(measured from records)Officially recorded in 3 countries · latest register: INSEE, 1991
Garou is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Cameroon than in any other country.
- CMCameroon≈1 in 52K(inferred from the name graph)
- DZAlgeria≈1 in 270K
- FRFrance≈1 in 300K
carrying the name, as Mondonomo estimates it from our sources: no national register counts it in these countries. Countries with no figure are shown too: flat where a national register lists the name without counting it, hatched where only our records hold it. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- Cameroon (inferred from the name graph)
- Record sources
- 98 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 52K (inferred from the name graph)
≈540 people, est.
corpus datasets behind its best-documented spelling
strongest: highest-authority source
Cameroon, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin
(measured from records)werewolf
Cited for this meaning 1
- kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Attested in 1 language in the etymology graph.
Where in the world
(measured from records)Garou 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 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CM Cameroon | ≈540 est. | ≈1 in 52K | — | Garou | 4 |
| FR France | ≈230 est. | ≈1 in 301K | 11 | Garou | 98 |
| DZ Algeria | ≈160 est. | ≈1 in 271K | — | Garou | 2 |
| MA Morocco | ≈29 est. | ≈1 in 1.2M | — | Garou | 4 |
| US United States | ≈8 est. | ≈1 in 40M | listed | Garou | 10 |
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: INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000); the us-wru-surnames-voterfile 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)Garou is also recorded in 2 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In Romanian, garrot
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In Romanian, GARÓU, garouri, s. n. Bandă sau tub, de obicei din cauciuc, care servește la întreruperea temporară a circulației sângelui într-o regiune a corpului (mai ales la braț), pentru a preveni sau a înlătura o hemoragie.
as a wordDEX online (dexonline.ro) - DEX '96 / DEX '98 definitions with etymology
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.
Evidence
(measured from records)3 registers and reference works attest this spelling, across 3 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1981 | 21 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1991 | 11 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1961 | 11 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1971 | 8 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1951 | 7 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1931 | 3 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1921 | 3 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1941 | 2 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1891 | 2 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1911 | 1 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1901 | 1 | — |
| US United States | wru Name Dictionary — US surnames, voter-file supplement (Khanna et al.) | — | — | — |
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- What does the name Garou mean, and where does it come from?
- werewolf Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).
- In which country does Garou have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 536 people named Garou in Cameroon, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled garou.
- How common is the name Garou?
- Mondonomo estimates about 540 people in Cameroon have Garou as their first surname, about 1 in 52 thousand residents. No national register counts it there; the figure is ours, calibrated against the registers that do.
What do you want to know about Garou?
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/garouThe 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, “Garou”. Data snapshot 2026-10-13.