Penelope
Barely 85 women in Poland carry it, rare enough that most people here have never met one. From Greek, meaning "weaver", it's edging back onto birth records after years at zero.
Penelope Pronunciation
Penelope is pronounced pe-ne-LO-pe (/pɛnɛˈlɔpɛ/).
What Penelope means
Where Penelope comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Penelope comes from Greek, from Πηνελόπη, the wife of Odysseus in Homer's Odyssey. She waited years for her husband to return from Troy. To hold off the suitors crowding her house, she wove a burial shroud and refused to choose until it was done. Each night she unpicked it. The name has long been tied to the Greek word pēnē, the weft pulled through a loom, and from that comes its English meaning: weaver.
In English-speaking use the name has faded and returned more than once, climbing again in recent decades. It sits among the classical revivals that parents reach for now. A Polish register would more often show the variant Penelopa.
Picture that variant written into a class register at the start of term, one Penelopa among the Zuzannas and Julias. The story behind it stays the same, and it still means weaver.
How many people are named Penelope
1 in 265222 women in Poland is named Penelope. 85 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #3840 among female names.
Penelope's popularity over time
2 girls were given the name in 2025, ranking #1783 among newborns. It has been climbing since 2023.
Where Penelope is most popular
Penelope is most popular in Masovian, 510% above the national average (2 girls born 2019–2025).
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Masovian2 girls born+510%
Penelope as a middle name
Penelope is a first name for 85 women in Poland and a middle name for another 34, a 71/29 split. In the women's middle-name ranking it sits 1202nd, between Nhi (34) and Sude (34).
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#1200 Naz34
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#1201 Nhi34
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#1202 Penelope34
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#1203 Sude34
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#1204 Suzanna34