Entry № 1796 · Italian origin

Caterina Caterina — Meaning, Origin & Baby Name Popularity

/ kah-teh-REE-nah /
Gender
Girl
Origin
Italian
Meaning
"Pure (Caterina de' Medici; Caterina Sforza)"
Syllables
4
First recorded
Medieval (Italian)

A name that means "pure (caterina de' medici; caterina sforza)".

Caterina is the Italian form of Catherine — from the Greek katharos (pure). Caterina de' Medici (1519-1589)Queen of France as wife of Henry II, regent during the reign of her sons Francis II, Charles IX, and Henry III — among the most powerful women in 16th-century Europe; she initiated the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre of Huguenots in 1572. Caterina Sforza (1463-1509)the warrior Countess of Forlì who defended her castle from Cesare Borgia, swearing that her enemies could kill her children but she would make more; among the most fearsome Italian Renaissance noblewomen.

Subject of countless biographies and Mantel's Wolf Hall (2009).

Pure. Caterina de' Medici's St. Bartholomew's Massacre; Caterina Sforza's defiance of Cesare Borgia.

The name in its native script.

Caterina
Transliteration
Caterina
Pronunciation
/ ˌkæt.əˈriː.nə /
Root
Grammatical form

Where Caterina stands.

Caterina does not currently appear in the US Social Security Administration's top 1,000 girls' names, so we don't publish a US rank or birth count for it. That says nothing about the name's standing elsewhere in the world — only that it sits outside the ranked US data we rely on.

Caterinas before her.

Real people
Caterina de' Medici
Queen of France.
1519 – 1589
Caterina Sforza
Countess of Forlì.
1463 – 1509
In fiction
Caterina
Vasari's Lives.
1550

Names connected to Caterina.

The number behind Caterina.

8

The Visionary

In Pythagorean numerology the letters of Caterina reduce to 8, The Visionary. This is a traditional interpretive system, not a factual claim about the name.