Berenika
Greek at root, and it carries the sense of bringing victory. Fewer than a thousand Polish women have it, and it's fading further: only three newborn girls last year.
Berenika Pronunciation
Berenika is pronounced be-re-NYEE-kah (/bɛrɛˈɲika/).
What Berenika means
Where Berenika comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Berenika reaches Polish from Greek, where Berenike was the Macedonian form of an older Pherenike. Break that word apart and you find pherein, to bring, set beside nike, victory. Put together, they say bringing victory. The sense holds.
The name belonged to royalty first. Several queens of Ptolemaic Egypt carried it, and one Berenice left her mark overhead: the star cluster Coma Berenices, the Hair of Berenice, still bears her name in astronomers' catalogues today. Legend has it she cut her hair as an offering to the gods, and the sky kept it.
In Poland the four syllables rarely last long. On a school register a girl may stand as Berenika in September and answer to Nika by October, the diminutive doing the everyday work. The short form travels light. The full name keeps its Greek sense intact: bringing victory.
When Berenika celebrates name day
Berenika appears 2 times in the Polish name day calendar, 1 of them as a main name, the first on 14 April.
The days Polish calendars list this name on. By custom you celebrate one of them, usually the first after your birthday.
Rarer dates. Only the most complete calendars add this name on these days. Most skip them, so hardly anyone celebrates then.
How many people are named Berenika
1 in 22589 women in Poland is named Berenika. 998 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #966 among female names.
Berenika's popularity over time
3 girls were given the name in 2025, ranking #1209 among newborns. It has been falling steadily since 2000. Still the #966 name among living women, even as it slips to #1209 among newborns.
Where Berenika is most popular
Berenika is most popular in Warmian-Masurian, 209% above the national average (4 girls born 2019–2025), followed by Masovian (+150%) and Lower Silesian (+76%). It is least common in Silesian and Pomeranian, 51% and 25% below average respectively.
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Warmian-Masurian4 girls born+209%
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Masovian16 girls born+150%
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Lower Silesian5 girls born+76%
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West Pomeranian2 girls born+31%
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Lublin2 girls born+8%
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Lesser Poland4 girls born−2%
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Subcarpathian2 girls born−8%
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Pomeranian2 girls born−25%
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Silesian2 girls born−51%
Berenika as a middle name
Berenika is a first name for 998 women in Poland and a middle name for another 660, a 60/40 split, almost evenly. In the women's middle-name ranking it sits 286th, between Jane (667) and Louise (656).
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#284 Wirginia675
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#285 Jane667
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#286 Berenika660
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#287 Louise656
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#288 Malina655