Mathieu
The French form of Matthew, from a Hebrew root meaning "gift of god". Fewer than 250 men in Poland carry it, and new ones grow rarer every year: most Poles will never meet a Mathieu.
Mathieu Pronunciation
What Mathieu means
Where Mathieu comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Mathieu is the French form of a Hebrew name, Mattityahu, built from a word for gift joined to a shortened form of the divine name. Rendered into English, it means gift of God. The most famous bearer of the original is Matthew the evangelist, and French speech reshaped his name into Mathieu across generations of church Latin.
In France it stayed common and plain. The director Mathieu Kassovitz, born in 1967, carries it. So does the actor Mathieu Amalric. The Hebrew sense of a gift given by God sits under the modern spelling, unchanged by the move from one language to the next.
A Polish child could meet it too. On a school register in Kraków, a Mathieu would sit near the Mateuszes, the two names sharing that single Hebrew root. Same origin, one French, one Polish. The meaning underneath both is gift of God.
How many people are named Mathieu
1 in 85728 men in Poland is named Mathieu. 249 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #1945 among male names.
Mathieu's popularity over time
Fewer than 2 boys were given the name in 2025. It has been falling steadily since 2000.
Mathieu as a middle name
Mathieu is a first name for 249 men in Poland and a middle name for another 56, an 82/18 split. In the men's middle-name ranking it sits 1001st, between Mamert (56) and Petteri (56).
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#999 Liwiusz56
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#1000 Mamert56
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#1001 Mathieu56
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#1002 Petteri56
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#1003 Ramzes56