Fiona

Feminine given name
Fiona
Pronunciation/fiˈoʊnə/ fee-OH-nə
GenderFeminine
Language(s)English
Origin
Language(s)Gaelic
Derivationfionn
Meaning"white", "fair"
Region of originIreland and Scotland
Other names
Related namesFionnghal, Fíona

Fiona is a feminine given name of Gaelic origin.

Etymology

The name is associated with the Gaelic traditions of Ireland and Scotland (through the poetry of James Macpherson), but has also become popular in England.[1] It can be considered either a Latinised form of the Gaelic word fionn, meaning "white", "fair",[1] or an Anglicisation of the Irish name Fíona (derived from an element meaning "vine").[2] The Scottish Gaelic feminine name Fionnghal (and variants) is sometimes equated with Fiona.[3] In ninth-century Welsh and Breton language 'Fion' (today: 'ffion') referred to the foxglove species and is also a female given name as in Ffion Hague.[4]

Popularity

Fiona was the 49th most popular name for baby girls born in 2008 in Germany.[5] Fiona was tied for third place in the ranking of most popular names for baby girls born in Liechtenstein in 2008.[6] The name was the 347th most popular name for girls born in the United States in 2008, where it has ranked among the top 1,000 most popular names for girls since 1990 and among the top 500 since 1999.[7] The name Fiona has been particularly popular for girls of Asian or Pacific Islander descent in New York City, where Fiona ranked as the ninth most popular name for girls from those groups in 2007.[8]

Notable people with the given name

  • Fiona Flanagan (1960), singer, born Fiona Flanagan
  • Fiona Alpass, New Zealand academic
  • Fiona Apple (1977), American singer
  • Fiona Baan (1938–1994), Scottish-born American sports administrator
  • Fiona Balfour, Australian business executive in the field of information technology
  • Fiona Bloom (1969), publicist
  • Fiona Bruce (1964), BBC presenter
  • Fiona Campbell, several people
  • Fiona Clark (1954), New Zealand photographer
  • Fiona Crawley (2002), American tennis player
  • Fiona Crombie (1973), Australian costume and production designer
  • Fiona Dourif (1981), American actress
  • Fiona Fairhurst (1971), inventor of the Speedo Fastskin swimsuit
  • Fiona Ferro (1997), French tennis player
  • Melanie Fiona (1983), Canadian singer
  • Fiona Fullerton (1956), English actress
  • Fiona Fung (1983), Hong Kong singer
  • Fiona Gubelmann (1980), American actress
  • Fiona Hammond (1983), Australian water polo player
  • Fiona Highet, Scottish entomologist
  • Fiona Hill (1965), British-American foreign affairs specialist
  • Fiona McLeod Hill (1973), British political adviser
  • Fiona McLeod (1964), Australian prominent barrister and Labor politician
  • Fiona Kennedy (1955), Scottish singer
  • Fiona Krautil (1956), Australian specialist in inclusion, diversity and equal opportunity in the workplace
  • Fiona MacDonald (1974), Scottish curler
  • Fiona J. Mackenzie, Scottish Gaelic singer
  • Fiona Macleod, pseudonym for English writer William Sharp (1855–1905)
  • Fiona Macpherson, FRSE, MAE (1971), Scottish Philosopher
  • Fiona Mactaggart (1953), British politician
  • Fiona May (1969), English-Italian athlete and actress
  • Fiona McFarlane (1978), Australian author
  • Fiona Millar (1958), British author and journalist
  • Fiona O'Donnell (1960), Scottish politician
  • Fiona O'Driscoll, Irish camogie player
  • Fiona O'Keeffe (born 1998), American long-distance runner
  • Fiona O'Loughlin (1963), Australian stand-up comedian
  • Fiona O'Loughlin (1965), Irish politician
  • Fiona O'Malley (1968), Irish politician
  • Fiona O'Shaughnessy (1979), Irish actor
  • Fiona O'Sullivan (1986), Irish footballer
  • Fiona Onasanya (1983), British politician
  • Fiona Phillips (1961), British journalist and broadcaster
  • Fiona Pitt-Kethley (1954), British poet, novelist and journalist
  • Fiona Richmond (1945), English glamour model
  • Fiona Ritchie (1960), American broadcaster
  • Fiona Robertson (1969), Scottish judoka and wrester
  • Fiona Robinson (1969), Australian basketball and handball player
  • Fiona Scott Morton (1967), American professor of economics
  • Fiona Shaw (1958), Irish actress
  • Fiona Sit (1981), Hong Kong Cantonese singer
  • Fiona Stanley (1946), Australian epidemiologist and public health researcher and leader
  • Fiona Staples, comic book artist
  • Fiona Urquhart (1987), Scottish cricketer
  • Fiona Watt, British children's author
  • Fiona Wood (1958), British born Australian plastic surgeon and burns specialist
  • Fiona Yuen (born 1976), German-born Hong Kong model and actress
  • Fiona Xie (1982), Singaporean television actress

Fictional characters

Other

  • Fiona (hippopotamus), first Nile hippo imaged on ultrasound pre-natally

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Hanks, Patrick; Hardcastle, Kate; Hodges, Flavia (2006), A Dictionary of First Names, Oxford Paperback Reference (2nd ed.), Oxford University Press, pp. 99–100, ISBN 978-0-19-861060-1.
  2. ^ Hanks, Hardcastle & Hodges 2006, pp. 348–349.
  3. ^ Mark, Colin (2003). The Gaelic-English Dictionary. Routledge. ISBN 0-203-27706-6.
  4. ^ The University of Wales' Dictionary website; accessed 21 April 2020.
  5. ^ "Die beliebtesten Vornamen des Jahres 2008". www.beliebte-vornamen.de.
  6. ^ "LLV". Archived from the original on 2013-11-05. Retrieved 2013-08-15.
  7. ^ OACT. "Popular Baby Names". www.ssa.gov. Archived from the original on 2018-02-02. Retrieved 2009-09-21.
  8. ^ "After More than a Decade, a Shift in the #1 New York City Baby Names". Archived from the original on 2010-02-09. Retrieved 2009-09-21.
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