Nereus
given name · Latin script
Meaning: Nereus is a boy's name of Greek origin meaning "water" (Biblical Names Compiled Database)
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
(measured from records)Officially recorded in 5 countries · latest register: Guyana, 2025
/neɾeus/(machine-generated) Spanish · model-generated
Nereus is a male given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Nigeria than in any other country.
- GYGuyana1 in 188K(measured from records)
- USUnited States≈1 in 7.8Mfew records
- MYMalaysia≈1 in 1Mfew records
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). 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.
- Nigeria (inferred from the name graph)
- Record sources
- 45 (measured from records)
- 1 in 188K (inferred from the name graph)
≈220 people, est.
corpus datasets behind its best-documented spelling
strongest: highest-authority source
Guyana
measured from records inferred from the name graph
How to pronounce Nereus
- Spanish:/neɾeus/(machine-generated) model-generated
- Portuguese:/nɛɾewʃ/(machine-generated) model-generated
- Swahili:/neɾeus/(machine-generated) model-generated
Readings marked model-generated were transcribed by a model; the others are quoted from the dictionary named.
Meaning & origin
(measured from records)Nereus is a boy's name of Greek origin meaning "water". It is associated with the wise and benevolent sea god of Greek mythology who was the father of the sea nymphs (the Nereids). As a biblical name, it belongs to a Christian in first-century Rome, and it is also the name of an early Roman saint, giving it both mythological and historical depth.
Cited for this meaning 1
- Biblical Names Compiled Database
Attested in 1 language in the etymology graph.
Where in the world
(measured from records)Nereus 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 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| NG Nigeria | ≈220 est. | ≈1 in 1.1M | — | Nereus | 15 |
| IN India | ≈110 est. | ≈1 in 13M | — | Nereus | 4 |
| PH Philippines | ≈70 est. | ≈1 in 1.7M | — | Nereus | 9 |
| US United States | ≈43 est. | ≈1 in 7.8M | listed | Nereus | 45 |
| MY Malaysia | ≈36 est. | ≈1 in 1M | — | Nereus | 10 |
| AU Australia | ≈22 est. | ≈1 in 1.2M | — | Nereus | 25 |
| GY Guyana | 4 | 1 in 188K | 4 | — | 1 |
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: Guyana — Official List of Electors July 2025. 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)Nereus 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 name Nereus is of Greek origin, derived from the word 'neros' meaning "water". In Greek mythology, Nereus was a primordial sea god known as the "Old Man of the Sea," respected for his wisdom and prophetic abilities.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
The mention of Nereus and his sister highlights the personal and communal nature of the early Christian church. Paul's specific greeting to them, among many others, underscores the value placed on each individual within the body of Christ and the importance of fellowship and mutual encouragement among believers in Rome.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
In English, The eldest son of Pontus (the sea) and Gaia (the earth).
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In English, sea-god in Greek mythology
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
In English, Biblical name
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
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)- Nereus Mendenhallb. 1819USAmerican educator
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)6 registers and reference works attest this spelling, across 5 countries.
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- How do you pronounce Nereus?
- It depends on the language: in Spanish /neɾeus/; in Portuguese /nɛɾewʃ/; in Swahili /neɾeus/. Transcriptions are machine-generated except where a dictionary is named.
- Where does the name Nereus come from?
- Nereus is a boy's name of Greek origin meaning "water". It is associated with the wise and benevolent sea god of Greek mythology who was the father of the sea nymphs (the Nereids). Recorded by Biblical Names Compiled Database.
- What are other forms of the name Nereus?
- In the etymology graph, Nereo and Nerijus are forms of the same name in other languages.
- Is Nereus a male or female name?
- Nereus 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.
- What does the name Nereus mean?
- Recorded meaning: Nereus is a boy's name of Greek origin meaning "water".
- Which countries have the most people named Nereus?
- Mondonomo estimates about 215 people named Nereus in Nigeria, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled nereus. After it come India, Philippines, United States and Malaysia; the country table on this page ranks them.
- Where is Nereus most common?
- Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Nereus is densest in Guyana — about 1 in 188 thousand people — even though Nigeria holds more of our records for it.
- How common is the name Nereus?
- In Guyana, the national register counted 4 people named Nereus in 2025, about 1 in 188 thousand residents.
What do you want to know about Nereus?
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/nereusThe 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, “Nereus”. Data snapshot 2026-10-13.