what qumquat says, plus a lot of common names are saints names, so they will be found in most European countries
and of the remaining a lot are traditional names, mostly borrowed from the French, at a time when French culture dominated Europe

I don't think it's a new thing that the names are the same, after all we're very closely related languages! Hannah, Anna, Sarah, Marie (pron. maria in German) are all biblical, and names like Laura are native to most European languages. (I'm a Laura and have met French, Spanish, German and Italian Lauras - mainly pronounced Low-rra which I love, apart from in France where they pronounce it Loraaaaaaaa, which makes me cringe!)

Thanks for that, thought that might be the case.

Louis is pronounced with the S in German: Loo-is.

I think it would be Loo-ee otherwise the S would be quite a strong S.

I love the name Lucas, was on my list of names for DS3.

Does anyone know how Louis would be pronounced in German? Loo-is or Loo-ee?

Wow - Didn't know my DS's name was so popular in Deutschland.

LOL at 'YAK'

Neele is pronounced Neeh-le (first syllable is a long 'eh').

Jack wouldn't work in German, as the German J is pronounced like an English 'Y', so it would be Yack - not very nice .

I just compared the list with the UK list and they are pretty much completely different. I don't see Jack, Alfie, Jaydon, Tyler etc on the German list...

That's funny, only Tim and Philip catch your eye really. Oh and Johanna and Neele on the girls' list. How is Neele pronounced?! Like Neill?

GooseyLoosey, I know what you mean. The power of media/internet/movies/books. We're all tuned into the same zeitgeist at the same time. The same names sound new and appealing at the same time in Germany, Spain, England, Ireland....

Oooh, those are so much nicer than the top UK list. I really like most of them.

No Wolfgang or Heidi either!

Some really nice names there.

Most of them look just like the names that are popular here to. Shame really, I like the idea of each country retaining distinctive naming conventions.

no Hans?

A german friend just emailed me a list of top baby names in Germany in 2008, in case any one is interested!

GIRLS
1. Hannah/Hanna
2. Leonie/Leoni
3. Lea/Leah
4. Lena
5. Mia
6. Anna
7. Emilie/Emily
8. Lara
9. Laura
10. Sara/Sarah
11. Emma
12. Lili/Lilli/Lilly
13. Marie
14. Lina
15. Maja/Maya
16. Johanna
17. Sofie/Sophie
18. Neele/Nele
19. Sofia/Sophia
20. Amelie

BOYS
1. Leon
2. Lucas/Lukas
3. Luka/Luca
4. Timm/Tim
5. Fynn/Finn
6. Luis/Louis
7. Jonas
8. Felix
9. Paul
10. Maximilian
11. Max
12. Niklas/Niclas
13. Julian
14. Ben
15. Elias
16. Jan
17. Noah
18. Moritz
19. Philip/Philipp
20. Yannik/Yannick/Yannic/Jannik