Melea
Feminine
Three unrelated Greek words all begin Mel-, and names built on that syllable can descend from any of them. Meli is honey, melas is black, and melia is the ash tree — the tree whose nymphs, in Hesiod, were the mothers of the human race.
How old is the name Melea?
Melea first appears in US birth records in 1954 — 71 years ago. The typical Melea alive today was born around 1994, making them about 31 years old. About 1,100 people named Melea are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Melea most popular?
Melea peaked in 1956, reaching #2249 nationally. Today it ranks #7491, 5,242 places below that high. See the whole 1956 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From melia to Melea
Our story of Melea
The Meliai are one of the stranger corners of Greek myth. In Hesiod's account of the world's ages, the men of the bronze race spring from ash trees — and the ash nymphs, the Meliai, are born from the blood of Ouranos when he is wounded. The link is practical as well as mythic: ash is the wood of spear shafts, and a race made from ash trees is a race made for war. The same tree carries weight far beyond Greece; Norse tradition makes the first man Askr, ash. So a name that may derive from Greek melia sits on a very old association between a specific timber, weapons, and the origin of people — and a modern American Melea, peaking in 1956, will almost certainly have arrived by way of Melissa or Amelia and none of that. Both facts are worth having.
Meaningnot established
Not established
Melea has no single documented source. It may be a modern form of Greek Melia, an ash-tree nymph; a respelling of Melia or Amelia; or an American formation on the Mel- stem. The three Greek roots that could underlie it are genuinely distinct: meli, honey, giving Melissa, a bee; melas, black, giving Melanie; and melia, the ash. Which one applies to a given family cannot be recovered from the spelling.
How the name formed
- melia
- Melia
- Melea
Related forms: Melia · Μελία
Pronouncing Melea
muh-LAY-uh
Three syllables, stress on the second. Some families say MEE-lee-uh or muh-LEE-uh; the spelling does not settle it, and all three are in use.
Nicknames for Melea
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
- 1954
- Most girls named
- 200632 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2249reached in 1956
- Change vs 2024
- +100.0%14 in 2025, from 7
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.
Melea in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Melia in English — spelling variant
- Μελία in Greek — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California.
Meleas among us
people named Melea are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 114,805 born in 2025 was named Melea
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Melea
- #7491
- Melea on the 2025 chart
- #935
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Melea went to 14 girls in 2025, but Meleah is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 25, which makes it the 935th most-given girls’ name of the year — 6,556 places above the chart.
- Melea14
- Meleah11
About 1 girl in 64,291 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 114,805 for Melea 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 Evamae test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Melea's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Evamae climbed just as high around 1916, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Evamae's path sketches the road Melea is walking now.
Melea 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
Melea beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Melea in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- It is soft, short and easy to say in English.
- Mel and Lea are both ready short forms that stand alone.
- It sits close to Amelia and Melia without being either.
- The pronunciation is genuinely unsettled between families.
- Melia and Amelia are far more common and will be substituted.
- There is no single meaning to give for the name.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Melea
Feminine · #7491 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Meleas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,100 people named Melea are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Melea?
- Melea is the most-used spelling in US records — 14 of the 25 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Meleah.
- How popular is the name Melea in 2025?
- Melea ranks #7491 among US girl names in 2025, with 14 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Melea?
- About 1 in every 114,805 US girls born in 2025 was named Melea — 14 in all.
- Will my child share the name Melea with classmates?
- Melea will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Melea
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Christie#7491 · Carmelita#7491 · Jetta#7491 · Hildegard#7491 · Rickie#7491 · Billy#7491 · Angelyn#7491 · Jewell#7491
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Melea? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Melea and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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