Entry № 4179 · Greek origin

Helena Helena — Meaning, Origin & Baby Name Popularity

/ HEL-en-ah /
Gender
Girl
Origin
Greek
Meaning
"Light, sun's ray, bright"
Syllables
3
First recorded
Ancient (Greek)

A name that means "light, sun's ray, bright".

Helena is the Latinised form of the Greek Helene (Ἑλένη) — meaning "sun's ray" or "bright." Helen of Troy, whose face launched a thousand ships in Homer's Iliad, was the most famous Greek Helen.

Helena has been continuously used across Europe for two thousand years. Today it sits in the U.S. top 350 and is rising.

Light, sun's ray, bright — a Greek name.

The name in its native script.

Ἑλένη
Transliteration
Helénē
Pronunciation
/ ˈhɛl.ən.ə /
Root
Grammatical form

Where Helena stands.

Helena 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.

Helenas before her.

Real people
Helena Bonham Carter
British actress.
born 1966
Saint Helena
Mother of Emperor Constantine. Patron saint of archaeologists.
c. 246 – c. 330
In fiction
Helena
Character in A Midsummer Night's Dream.
c. 1595 play

Names connected to Helena.

The number behind Helena.

9

The Giver

In Pythagorean numerology the letters of Helena reduce to 9, The Giver. This is a traditional interpretive system, not a factual claim about the name.