Next week the Office of National Statistics (ONS) will publish the most popular boys and girls names in Britain in 2013. Last year Harry was the most popular boys name but only by 29 children, over the traditional Muslim name Muhammad.
The name of the Islamic prophet is already the most popular boys name in London, and there are rumours that next week it will be crowned the biggest name right across the country. But Muhammad does not appear on the official top ten list of popular names because it has various different spellings.
Instead of grouping the spellings together and admitting how popular Muhammad is, the ONS chooses not to. Also they do not publicise the top twenty list – which features the most popular spelling of Muhammad in 19th place – leaving just the top ten, which is dominated by old favourites like Thomas, James and Charlie.
So on the official statistics Muhammad is 19th, Mohammed is 26th and Mohammad is 60th. These three added to the other even more obscure spellings came to a total of 7139 babies in 2012, compared to 7168 for Harry.
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