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Davena
How to Pronounce Davena
Pronounced duh-VEE-nuh /dəˈviː.nə/Medium
Meaning: Davena is a feminine form of David, built like the Scottish Davina by adding a feminine ending to the Hebrew name David, which means beloved. It carries the same warm root sense in a softer, distinctly feminine shape.Medium
Popularity in the U.S. · SSA data
U.S. births per year (Social Security Administration, 1880–present). Pink marker = peak year.
SSA data updated May 2026. How we source & verify this data.
History & Origin
Davena is a feminine form of David (Hebrew for beloved), close kin to the Scottish Davina. Names of this kind let daughters carry a family David forward, and the -ena ending gives Davena a gentle, old-fashioned lilt. It appears sparingly across the twentieth century.
Davena was never common in the United States, reaching only about twenty girls a year at its high point around 1980 and lingering quietly in the records into recent years. A woman named Davena then is in her forties today.
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Frequently Asked
What does the name Davena mean?
It is a feminine form of David, which is Hebrew for beloved; it is a cousin of Davina.
How do you pronounce Davena?
It is said duh-VEE-nuh /dəˈviː.nə/, three syllables with the stress in the middle.
Is Davena a boy or girl name?
Davena is used here as a girl's name.
How popular is Davena?
It has always been rare in the United States, given to only about twenty girls a year at its peak around nineteen-eighty.