Entry № 11465 · Kikuyu origin

Wangari Wangari — Meaning, Origin & Baby Name Popularity

/ wahn-GAH-ree /
Gender
Girl
Origin
Kikuyu
Meaning
"Leopard (first African woman Nobel Peace laureate)"
Syllables
3
First recorded
Ancient (Kikuyu)

A name that means "leopard (first african woman nobel peace laureate)".

Wangari is from the Kikuyu word for "leopard" in the totemic clan system of the Kikuyu people of Kenya. Wangari Maathai (1940-2011) was the Kenyan environmental and political activist who founded the Green Belt Movement, planting over 30 million trees across Africa.

Leopard (first African woman Nobel Peace laureate) — a Kikuyu name.

The name in its native script.

Wangari
Transliteration
Wangari
Pronunciation
/ wɑːnˈɡɑː.ri /
Root
Grammatical form

Where Wangari stands.

Wangari 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.

Wangaris before her.

Real people
Wangari Maathai
Kenyan Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
1940 – 2011
In fiction
Wangari
Taking Root.
2008

Names connected to Wangari.

The number behind Wangari.

1

The Leader

In Pythagorean numerology the letters of Wangari reduce to 1, The Leader. This is a traditional interpretive system, not a factual claim about the name.