Madison

Madison is an English surname turned given name, derived from a medieval diminutive of Maud (itself a Norman French form of Matilda), combined with the common patronymic suffix meaning son of, so its literal sense is son of Maud or son of Matilda. It gained wide recognition as a surname through James Madison, the fourth President of the United States, and its transformation into a feminine given name was famously popularized by the 1984 film Splash, in which a mermaid adopts the name from a New York street sign. Its use as a girl's name surged dramatically in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, making it one of the most common female names in English-speaking countries. Related forms include Madisyn, Maddison, and the shortened nickname Maddie.