Xander

Xander comes from “Alexander,” but it’s shorter and with its “x” pronounced as a “z” (ZAN-der). It’s an invented name that might sound like a nickname to some, but it’s not—plenty of birth certificates list “Xander” as the newborn’s given name. It made the baby-name charts for the first time in 1999, probably helped by a character with the name on “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” A real-life Xander, born in 2011, is the son of January Jones of “Mad Men.”