Bambi

Bambi in Italian can mean bambi-no (male baby) because in Italian there is a male and female of each word, which does not exist in English. So Bambi in the case of Felix Salten meant "bambino" (young boy) or better translated "child". (Although in Italy it is not used, it would be considered a name for both sexes like Andrea and a few others).

Bambi is an African female name. Meaning THE FLOWER OF LIFE. Mostly used in the middle parts of Africa.

Bambi means 'small deer' in Japanese.

Adding to the femininity of the name, "bambi" also happens to be the word for "pink" in Arabic.

Bambi was in rare use as a girl's name in the USA before the Swiss author Felix Salten ever wrote his novel about the male deer, which Disney's movie was later based on. Salten's book was first published in German in 1923 and translated in English in 1928. But in 1914 the American novelist Marjorie Benton Cooke published her novel _Bambi_, where the title character was a wealthy young American heiress. That novel explains that Bambi is a nickname from "bambina", the feminine form of the same Italian word for "baby" that Salten took his character's name from. [noted -ed]

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So as a girl's name Bambi is at least nine years older than its use for the male deer.

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http://www.gutenberg.org/files/11197/11197-h/11197-h.htm