Gisella
Feminine · “a pledge”
Gisella comes from a Germanic word that names a hostage — and that is less alarming than it sounds. In early medieval Europe noble children were exchanged as pledges to guarantee treaties, and the word for such a child, gisil, became a respectable name element carried by Charlemagne's own sister. Its American peak is 1895.
How old is the name Gisella?
Gisella first appears in US birth records in 1895 — 130 years ago. The typical Gisella alive today was born around 2005, making them about 20 years old. About 1,400 people named Gisella are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Gisella most popular?
Gisella peaked in 1895, reaching #1426 nationally. Today it ranks #5917, 4,491 places below that high. See the whole 1895 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From gisil to Gisella
The story of Gisella
Gisela was the name of Charlemagne's sister, of a daughter of Charlemagne, and of the Bavarian princess who married Stephen I and became the first queen of Hungary — a substantial run of royal bearers across three centuries. The name stayed common in Germany, Austria and Hungary and passed into Italian as Gisella and French as Giselle. Adolphe Adam's ballet Giselle, first performed in Paris in 1841, gave the French form international currency. American records show Gisella with German, Austrian and Hungarian migration in the late nineteenth century, peaking in 1895 with the rest of that cohort.
Meaning
a pledge; a hostage given as surety
Germanic gisil means a hostage or pledge, and it is the first element of Gisela, Giselle, Gisbert and Gilbert. The practice behind it was ordinary early medieval diplomacy: children of high rank were exchanged and raised at another court to guarantee an agreement, and being such a hostage was a position of standing rather than of shame. The derivation is settled and appears in every standard reference.
How the name formed
- gisil
- Gisela
- Gisella
Related forms: Gisella · Gisela · Giselle · Gizella
Pronouncing Gisella
jee-ZEL-lah
Three syllables, stress in the middle. Italian gives the g a soft j sound; German says GEE-zeh-lah with a hard g and front stress; French Giselle is zhee-ZEL. All three are heard on American bearers depending on the family's origin.
Nicknames for Gisella
High
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
- 1895
- Most girls named
- 201154 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1426reached in 1895
- Change vs 2023
- −39.4%20 in 2025, from 33
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.
Gisella in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Gisella in Italian — same name
- Gisela in German — related form
- Giselle in French — related form
- Gizella in Hungarian — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York.
Gisellas among us
people named Gisella are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 80,363 born in 2025 was named Gisella
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Gisella
- #5917
- Gisella on the 2025 chart
- #903
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Gisella went to 20 girls in 2025, but Gisela is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 57, which makes it the 903rd most-given girls’ name of the year — 5,014 places above the chart.
- Gisela37
- Gisella20
About 1 girl in 28,198 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 80,363 for Gisella itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
Fashion outlook
Gisella sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Gisella beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Gisella in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Gigi and Ella are both current, warm short forms.
- The meaning is concrete and its historical context is genuinely interesting.
- It has an unusually distinguished run of royal bearers across three countries.
- The initial g is said three different ways depending on the language of the reader.
- Gisela, Gisella, Giselle and Gizella all circulate as forms of one name.
- The literal meaning is a hostage, which needs the context to land properly.
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Gisella
Feminine · #5917 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Gisellas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,400 people named Gisella are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Gisella?
- Gisella is one of 2 recorded spellings. Gisela is the more common one — 37 births in 2025 against 20 for Gisella.
- How popular is the name Gisella in 2025?
- Gisella ranks #5917 among US girl names in 2025, with 20 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Gisella?
- About 1 in every 80,363 US girls born in 2025 was named Gisella — 20 in all.
- Will my child share the name Gisella with classmates?
- Gisella will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Gisella
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Elda#5917 · Saloma#5917 · Fawn#5917 · Sarafina#5917 · Jaymie#5917 · Jania#5917 · Kimberlynn#5917 · Patsy#5917
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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