English

Proper noun

Cecilia

1. A female given name.
   • 1694 Joseph Addison, A Song for St. Cecilia's Day:

     Hark how the flutes and trumpets raise / At bright Cecilia's name, their lays!

   • 1854 Charles Dickens, Hard Times, Book I, Chapter II:

     ‘Sissy is not a name,’ said Mr. Gradgrind. ‘Don’t call yourself Sissy. Call yourself Cecilia.’ ‘It’s father as calls me Sissy, sir,’ returned the young girl in a trembling voice, and with another curtsey. ‘Then he has no business to do it,’ said Mr. Gradgrind. ‘Tell him he mustn’t. Cecilia Jupe. Let me see. What is your father?’

   • 1928 Lynn Montross, Silent Minstrel, in American Magazine, volume 106, page 14:

     Because they had named her Cecilia, her parents fancied that the matter of her life and character had been fairly well settled. She would, of course, be quiet and pale and mystical, like the saint whose picture hung above the old upright piano in the Kirby living-room.

Related terms

• (pet forms): Sissy, Ceecee, CeeCee
• (variants): Cecelia, Cecile, Cecily, Cicely
• (male form): Cecil
• (related names): Sheila, Celia

Translations

German

Proper noun

Cecilia

1. A female given name, a spelling variant of Cäcilia.

Italian

Proper noun

Cecilia f

1. A female given name, cognate to English Cecilia.

Anagrams

• celiaci, ciecali

Spanish

Proper noun

Cecilia f

1. A female given name, cognate to English Cecilia.

Swedish

Etymology

From Latin saint's name Caecilia. First recorded in Sweden in the 12th century.

Proper noun

Cecilia

1. A female given name.

References

• Roland Otterbjörk: Svenska förnamn, Almqvist & Wiksell 1996, ISBN 91-21-10937-0
• Statistiska centralbyrån and Sture Allén, Staffan Wåhlin, Förnamnsboken, Norstedts 1995, ISBN 9119551622: 63 761 females with the given name Cecilia living in Sweden on December 31st, 2010, with the frequency peak in the 1970s. Accessed on 19 June 2011.