Santa

Where Santa comes from

The dictionaries list Santa as a given name — a female given name from Italian — but don't trace where it came from. The record below is what the SSA data shows.

  • Italian
  • 2 syllables
  • Vowel-ended
Along the way
  1. 1896
    First appearance
    #1,416 among girls, 6 babies — the first year at least five got the name.
  2. 1915
    Peak, #723
    85 babies named Santa — more than any year before or since.
  3. 1932
    The fade
    The first year with half the peak's births — down to #1,192.
  4. 1970
    Santa Montefiore born
    British author
  5. 1975
    Santa Anzo born
    Ugandan model, fashion designer and proprietor of Arapapa Fashion house
In the dictionary
  • A female given name from Italian.
Namesakes
  • Santa Montefiore · British author, born 1970
  • Santa Anzo · Ugandan model, fashion designer and proprietor of Arapapa Fashion house, born 1975
  • Santa Dimopulos · Ukrainian singer, born 1987
  • Santa Pakenytė · Lithuanian judoka, born 1990
  • Santa della Pietà · Italian composer, born 1750

Sources: the origin note and dictionary entry are quoted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0); the namesakes come from Wikidata (CC0); the milestones are worked out from the SSA record.