Claretha
Feminine · “Bright”
Claret is an English word for red Bordeaux that the French do not use. It came from clairet, meaning a light or pale wine, and English kept it after the French had moved on, applying it to exactly the wine the French call red and nothing else.
How old is the name Claretha?
Claretha first appears in US birth records in 1918 — 107 years ago. The typical Claretha alive today was born around 1947, making them about 78 years old. About 700 people named Claretha are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Claretha most popular?
Claretha peaked in 1933, reaching #1330 nationally. See the whole 1933 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Clara to Claretha
The story of Claretha
The word records a lost style of wine. Medieval Bordeaux exported a pale, briefly fermented red that was neither of the two things a modern drinker would recognize, and the English, who owned the region for three centuries and drank enormous quantities of it, called it by the word for its color. The wine changed, the color deepened, the French dropped the term, and English kept it out of habit and applied it to the successor. It is now used almost entirely by English people talking about Bordeaux and by nobody else, which is the usual fate of a trade word that outlives its trade.
Meaningscholars disagree
Bright, clear
The front carries the Latin clarus, bright or distinguished, which gives Clara and Clare and also the words clarity and declare. The ending carries nothing at all. Whether the name was built from Clara or from Claretta by way of the ear is not recorded.
How the name formed
- Clara
- Claretha
Pronouncing Claretha
kluh-REE-thuh
Three syllables with the stress in the middle. The th is the voiced one, as in this, which is what English does to that letter between two vowels.
Nicknames for Claretha
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1918
- Most girls named
- 195038 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1330reached in 1933
- Change vs 1984
- 0.0%5 in 1989, from 5
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Clarethas among us
people named Claretha are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Claretha sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- Clara sits inside it as a complete and entirely current name.
- The meaning of the front is transparent and easy to give a child.
- It is genuinely rare while containing no unfamiliar sound.
- The ending belongs to no language and cannot be explained to a child who asks.
- Claretta and Cloretha are close and will both be substituted.
- It is firmly dated to the first half of the twentieth century.
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Claretha
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Clarethas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 700 people named Claretha are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Claretha in 2025?
- Claretha is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Claretha with classmates?
- Claretha will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More C names
The most-given names starting with C, all years combined.
Carol#2239 · Cynthia#1013 · Catherine#313 · Christine#1272 · Carolyn#1222 · Christina#770 · Charlotte#2 · Cheryl#4352
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Claretha? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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