Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander

Meaning: “My God is an oath”
Gender: Female
Pronunciation: LEES-bet or LIZ-beth
Origin: German
Other forms of the name: Elisabeth, Elizabeth, Lizbeth, Liesbeth, Lijsbeth

The dark heroine of the Swedish novel “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”, Lisbeth Salander, could give this name a bit of a punch that it needs. It has already been made into a Swedish movie starring Noomi Rapace and the American movie will be out soon starring Rooney Mara, so it seems fated to a rise in popularity. The name Lisbeth is a German short form of the name Elisabeth; it has only been on the US’s top names list twice, once in 2002 at #624 and in 2003 at #741. The name Elisabeth is sometimes used instead of Elizabeth in the Bible and is quite popular US, Norway, Austria, the Netherlands, and France.
Lisbeth Salander got her name because author Stieg Larsson witnessed a girl being sexually abused when he was 15 whose name was Lisbeth. He never forgave himself for not helping her and this inspired the theme of sexual abuse against women. Lisbeth is a young antisocial but extremely intelligent computer hacker and private detective who is described as being pale and anorexic with short hair and a pierced nose and eyebrows. She has a wasp tattoo on her neck, a loop on her left arm and one on her ankle, and a dragon tattoo sometimes visible on her shoulder.