Marianna
Feminine · “Maria and Anna joined”
Marianna reads as two of the oldest names in Europe set end to end — Maria and Anna — and the seam between them barely shows. Four syllables that rise in the middle and settle on a soft vowel, it has been written this way in Italian, Polish, Hungarian and Greek for centuries. It has been on American records since the nineteenth century without ever crowding a classroom.
How old is the name Marianna?
Marianna first appears in US birth records in 1883 — 142 years ago. The typical Marianna alive today was born around 1997, making them about 28 years old. About 15,000 people named Marianna are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Marianna most popular?
Marianna peaked in 1929, reaching #609 nationally. Today it ranks #872, 263 places below that high. See the whole 1929 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Miryam to Marianna
The story of Marianna
Both roads into this name are old. Marianus was a Roman family name, and its feminine Mariana passed into Spanish, Portuguese and Italian; separately, the habit of joining Maria to a second saint's name gave Catholic Europe Maria Anna, which contracted into a single word. Marianna is the form that settled in Italian, Polish, Hungarian and Greek, while French kept Marianne — the name that became the personification of the French Republic in the 1790s and remains so. American records show Marianna arriving in the nineteenth century, most likely along several immigration routes at once, and it has been written here continuously ever since.
Meaningscholars disagree
Maria and Anna joined; or "of Marius"
Two serious readings meet at this spelling. Most often Marianna is read as a compound of Maria (the Latin and Greek form of Hebrew Miryam) and Anna (from Hebrew Hannah, "grace, favor") — a pairing that became common in Catholic Europe. It also functions as an elaborated spelling of Mariana, the feminine of the Roman family name Marianus, itself from Marius. The Miryam element has no settled translation of its own, despite the many offered over the years.
How the name formed
- Miryam
- Maria
- Maria Anna
- Marianna
Related forms: Marianna · Marianna · Marianna · Mariana · Marianne · Μαριάννα
Pronouncing Marianna
mar-ee-AN-uh
Four syllables with the stress on the third. Italian, Polish and Greek speakers give the same name a fuller third vowel, closer to ma-ree-AH-na, and both are correct for the name.
Nicknames for Marianna
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
- 1883
- Most girls named
- 2006419 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #609reached in 1929
- Change vs 2022
- −10.5%308 in 2025, from 344
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.
Marianna in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Marianna in Italian — same name
- Marianna in Polish — same name
- Marianna in Hungarian — same name
- Mariana in Spanish — spelling variant
- Marianne in French — related form
- Μαριάννα in Greek — transliteration
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, California, New York.
Mariannas among us
people named Marianna are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 5,218 born in 2025 was named Marianna
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Marianna
- #872
- Marianna on the 2025 chart
- #213
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Marianna went to 308 girls in 2025, but Mariana, Maryanna and Maryana are the same name said out loud. Together the 5 spellings went to 1,538, which makes it the 213th most-given girls’ name of the year — 659 places above the chart.
and 1 rarer spelling.
About 1 girl in 1,045 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 5,218 for Marianna 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
The Madaline test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Marianna's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Madaline climbed just as high around 1906, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Madaline's path sketches the road Marianna is walking now.
Marianna 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
Where Marianna is headed
Marianna should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
High confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Marianna beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Marianna in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Written the same way in Italian, Polish, Hungarian and Greek, so it travels across those languages without being respelled.
- Contains two names most people already know how to spell, which makes the whole easier to hold onto than its length suggests.
- A long, unbroken record in American use, with no fashion spike to date it to one narrow stretch of years.
- Several established short forms — Mari, Anna, Maria, Nina — all of them in real use rather than invented.
- The single-n Mariana, the French Marianne and the two-word Mary Anne are all live spellings, so she will spend her life confirming which one she is. Not hard, just frequent.
- Because the short forms Maria and Anna are complete names themselves, the full four syllables can quietly disappear in daily use unless the family keeps them.
- Four syllables ask a lot of a long or multi-syllable surname; it is worth saying the whole thing aloud a few times.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Marianna
Feminine · #872 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Mariannas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 15,000 people named Marianna are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Marianna?
- Marianna is one of 4 recorded spellings. Mariana is the more common one — 1,192 births in 2025 against 308 for Marianna.
- How popular is the name Marianna in 2025?
- Marianna ranks #872 among US girl names in 2025, with 308 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Marianna?
- About 1 in every 5,218 US girls born in 2025 was named Marianna — 308 in all.
- Will my child share the name Marianna with classmates?
- Marianna will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Marianna
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Adrianna#872 · Julie#872 · Aspyn#869 · Kylee#875 · Johanna#869 · Ayah#869 · Kahlani#875 · Lyanna#877
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Marianna? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Marianna and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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