Helena
From the Greek for "torch, shining light". A comeback name: barely used at the millennium, it now sits inside the hundred most-given girls' names in Poland.
Helena Pronunciation
Helena is pronounced khe-LE-nah (/xɛˈlɛna/).
What Helena means
Where Helena comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Helena comes from Greek, where the older forms point toward a torch and its shining light. The most famous early bearer is Helen of Troy, whose name Homer set at the center of a long war. Centuries later a second Helena mattered more to the church: Saint Helena, mother of the emperor Constantine, remembered for the pilgrimage on which tradition says she found the True Cross. Her feast on the 18th of August still marks a name-day in Poland.
The name traveled and shed length. In Polish it keeps its full shape, Helena, while opening shorter doors: Hela at home, Helenka for a small girl, Lena almost anywhere. The variant Yelena carries the same word east into Russian.
Lena has grown so common that many people meet it first and learn only later where it began. That older sense, torch and shining light, sits under each of these forms. A girl signing Helena on a form at the urząd writes four syllables that once meant a burning light.
When Helena celebrates name day
Helena appears 8 times in the Polish name day calendar, 3 of them as a main name, the first on 2 March.
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 Helena
1 in 141 women in Poland is named Helena. 159,464 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #91 among female names.
Helena's popularity over time
2,493 girls were given the name in 2025, ranking #26 among newborns. It has been climbing since 2000.
Where parents choose Helena
Helena is most popular in Masovian, 40% above the national average (4,202 girls born 2019–2025), followed by Greater Poland (+27%) and Pomeranian (+10%). It is least common in Subcarpathian and Opole, 42% and 33% below average respectively.
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Masovian
+40%1 in 84 babies
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Greater Poland
+27%1 in 93 babies
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Pomeranian
+10%1 in 107 babies
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Subcarpathian
−42%1 in 204 babies
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Opole
−33%1 in 175 babies
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Holy Cross
−31%1 in 170 babies
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Masovian+40% 4,202 born1 in 84 babies+40%
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Greater Poland+27% 2,326 born1 in 93 babies+27%
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Pomeranian+10% 1,378 born1 in 107 babies+10%
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Kuyavian-Pomeranian+4% 969 born1 in 113 babies+4%
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Łódź−1% 1,064 born1 in 119 babies−1%
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Lesser Poland−4% 1,842 born1 in 123 babies−4%
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Lower Silesian−9% 1,214 born1 in 129 babies−9%
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Warmian-Masurian−9% 552 born1 in 130 babies−9%
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Lublin−10% 782 born1 in 131 babies−10%
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Podlaskie−22% 434 born1 in 152 babies−22%
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West Pomeranian−22% 562 born1 in 150 babies−22%
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Silesian−22% 1,511 born1 in 151 babies−22%
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Lubusz−23% 324 born1 in 153 babies−23%
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Holy Cross−31% 326 born1 in 170 babies−31%
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Opole−33% 263 born1 in 175 babies−33%
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Subcarpathian−42% 590 born1 in 204 babies−42%
Helena as a middle name
Helena is a first name for 159,464 women in Poland and a middle name for another 155,002, a 51/49 split, almost evenly. In the women's middle-name ranking it sits 17th, between Janina (158,653) and Marta (135,087).
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#15 Monika163,923
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#16 Janina158,653
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#17 Helena155,002
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#18 Marta135,087
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#19 Dorota133,476