Orma
Feminine
Orma is one of the short, opaque American women's names of the turn of the last century, and no source records where it came from. The French words it resembles name a decorative technique that was beautiful and reliably fatal to the people who made it.
How old is the name Orma?
Orma first appears in US birth records in 1890 — 135 years ago. The typical Orma alive today was born around 1923, making them about 102 years old. Fewer than a hundred people named Orma are estimated to be alive in the US today — a true one-of-a-kind name.
When was the name Orma most popular?
Orma peaked in 1905, reaching #825 nationally. See the whole 1905 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
Origin, sound and short forms
Our story of Orma
Ormolu means ground gold, from the French, and it names the gilded bronze mounts on eighteenth-century French furniture and clocks — the leaves, the swags, the mounts on the corners of a commode. The process that produced it was mercury gilding: gold was dissolved in mercury to make an amalgam, painted onto the bronze, and the piece was then heated until the mercury boiled off, leaving the gold bonded to the metal. What boiled off went into the workshop. Gilders working this way were poisoned steadily and predictably, and contemporaries said plainly that few of them lived past forty. The technique was banned in France in the nineteenth century for that reason and replaced with electroplating. The objects are in every major museum, and the reason they look the way they do is that somebody breathed mercury vapour to make them.
Meaningnot established
Not established
Three candidates exist and none is documented: a shortening of Norma, a shortening of a surname like Ormond, or an independent build of the kind that decade produced in quantity. A people in Kenya carry the same four letters, and there is no evidence of any connection.
Pronouncing Orma
OR-muh
Two syllables with the stress at the front. The second syllable reduces almost to nothing, which is why the name is sometimes written with an e in older records.
Nicknames for Orma
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
- 1890
- Most girls named
- 192132 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #825reached in 1905
- Change vs 1948
- 0.0%8 in 1950, from 8
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.
Ormas among us
Fewer than a hundred people named Orma are estimated to be alive in the US today — a true one-of-a-kind name.
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Orma 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
- Four letters with no silent ones make it quick to write and simple to spell aloud.
- It is genuinely rare and belongs to almost nobody now living.
- Two syllables with front stress is the plainest shape English has.
- Norma and Oma will both be written for it.
- It reads as belonging to one specific generation.
- Nothing is documented about its origin, so the meaning question has no honest answer.
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Orma
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Ormas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. Fewer than a hundred people named Orma are estimated to be alive in the US today — a true one-of-a-kind name.
- How popular is the name Orma in 2025?
- Orma is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Orma with classmates?
- Orma will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More O names
The most-given names starting with O, all years combined.
Olivia#1 · Opal#423 · Olive#197 · Olga#3167 · Ollie#2276 · Ora#3712 · Ola#7885 · Ophelia#264
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Orma? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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