I was looking at this thread when something that I already remarked in the past struke me : the popularity of female french given name in the english speaking world.

Now I understand that the different countries and cultures of the western world share a great deal of given name. But most of the time, they won't be identical and will be adapted locally. The english Mary for instance, will be Marie in french or Maria in italian/spanish. The french Jean will be the english John or the spanish Juan. The french Eveline will be the english Evelyn.

Well, I am not considering this kind of names. Theses names have obviously a common origin, but have evolved mostly separatly and Mary isn't a french name or a spanish name. It is a english name in its own right.

No, I am talking about french given name, considered as deeply french that have disctintive french features that don't really exist in english, but that you meet really often in english speaking countries. Like if instead of giving the english name Peter, people in England started to give the name Pierre for instance.

Jacqueline for instance can be (but not often) meet in an english speaking country. But it's a name distinctively french : Jacques, pronunced exactly like Jack, is a common male french given name that doesn't exist in english (Jacqueline being its feminization); the construction -cques, is typically french and doesn't exist in english; the construction -line with the final -e marking the feminine is also typically french, the english version would be -lyn (like Eveline/Evelyn).

The same goes for Charlotte, quite popular in english-speaking countries and also french : in english Charlotte and Charlot would be pronunced the same way; but in french Charlot would be pronunced Charlo, single final consonants always being silent. So the there is the need to double the consonant and add a e, a typically french feature meet really often.

Also, Jacqueline and Charlotte are very common in France, and their french origin seem to be confirmed by wikipedia.

Same goes for the french Marguerite, given in english speaking culture along its english counterpart Margaret.

The list goes on with Belle, Annabelle, Marianne, Michelle, Sophie (non french version being often Sophia), Danielle, Elise, Amelie, Valerie, Chloé etc. and actually most female name finishing in -elle, -ine or -ie, differents exemples of feminization in french.

And, interestingly enough, while french female given name seem to be popular, uniquely french male given nam seem to be non-existent, or at least way less given. You'll find Paul or Robert in both culture but none of them is more english or french.

TL;DR : Why are female french given name so popular in the english speaking world ?