Can anyone tell me about the popularity of the names Isabel or Isabelle in the United States prior to 1900? I was going through some ancestral records of my mothers and came across a woman born in 1863 named Mary Isabel. I read that the name Isabel is Spanish. (?) We have no hispanic ancestors that we know of. Should we find it unusual that a caucasian woman from the Southern US was named Isabel in the 1880s? Would this name have mostly been used by people with hispanic origins or by others as well? What if her name had been spelled Isabelle? More unusual? Less unusual? Thanks for your help!!
MJ