The name Messi is banned for children in Argentina

Although Argentine star Lionel Messi is considered a national hero in his country, the law in Argentina does not allow his famous surname to be converted into a first name for newborns, based on legislation dating back to 1969 that prohibits the use of family names as personal names, to avoid the confusion that this might cause in civil records.
Despite this ban, in 2014, an Argentine couple succeeded in obtaining an official exception after an administrative battle, so that their son, “Messi David Varela,” became the first child to officially keep “Messi” as a first name.
Although more than a decade has passed since that precedent, there are only 11 citizens or legal residents of Argentina who bear the name “Messi,” and all of them are no more than 19 years old, according to data from the National Register of Persons until June 2025.
The number is very small, as Messi is called: 205 people in the United States, 265 in France, 363 in Brazil, and 3,400 people in Peru.
After the media uproar caused by allowing the registration of the child “Messi” in the province of Rio Negro, other parents in the province of Santa Fe, Messi’s birthplace, tried to repeat the experiment, but the civil registry authorities rejected all requests, stressing that national law prohibits the use of surnames as first names.
100,000 people in Argentina bear the name Lionel, 87% of whom were born after Messi’s debut with Barcelona in 2004, while the popularity of the name increased after Argentina won the 2022 World Cup, as 9,505 children were registered with the name “Lionel” during the year 2023, and 446 girls named “Lionella.”