Meaning and background
The story behind Ray
Ray has a personal-name route as a short form of Raymond and a separate coincidence with the English word for a beam of light. Behind the Name also lists Ray Bradbury and Ray Charles among notable bearers. For a dog, that offers family, literary, musical or light-related associations. The light interpretation should remain a word association rather than replace the documented relationship between Ray and Raymond.
- Origin
- Short form of Raymond; coincides with the English word for a beam of light. Source
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About Ray
Recorded as a dog’s name
Ray appears in 13 dog licence records in the 2026 New York City dataset.
How to read this count
These records cover New York City and may count the same dog in more than one licence period. They are not a national popularity ranking.
Pronunciation and rhythm
/ɹeɪ/
US English sound sequence, converted from the CMU dictionary. Stress marks are shown separately.
Stress on the first syllable in the recorded US readings.
View dictionary notation
/ɹeɪ/ · primary stress on syllable 1R EY1
These are US dictionary readings. Personal, regional and other language pronunciations may differ.
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Sources and research notes (2)
- New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene NYC Dog Licensing Dataset — extract_year 2026 — Dog licence periods, not unique dogs; NYC only. No owner-level fields retrieved.
- Carnegie Mellon University / CMU Sphinx maintainers CMU US English Pronouncing Dictionary — US English dictionary readings; not owner-specific or exhaustive multilingual pronunciation
References support the individual facts shown. A source link does not mean the entire profile has been verified.