Pauline is the French feminine of Paul, from the Latin paulus, "small" or "humble", and was a fashionable name in America from the 1880s through the 1920s. The silent-film serial The Perils of Pauline made it a household word in 1914. Today it is a quiet vintage choice: number 1303 in 2000, its best rank of the period, and number 2986 in 2025.