Given name & surname
Morna
“one who is affectionate; beloved”
Morna has Irish and Scottish naming associations and a place in the Ossianic poems.
Meaning & origin
What it means
One Irish interpretation is “one who is affectionate; beloved.”
Where it comes from
An origin associated with this spelling is Irish.
The story
In James Macpherson’s Ossianic poems, Morna is the name of Fingal’s mother. This literary context forms part of the name’s history alongside its connection with Myrna.
Morna through the years
- Babies since 1880
- 402
- 0 boys · 402 girls
- Most popular year
- 1924
- 19 babies
- 2025
- 0
- Outside the ranked list
- 2021–25 vs 2016–20
- —
- Too few births to compare
By the numbers
The most recent published U.S. birth count for girls is 5 in 1976. Later missing counts do not mean the name went unused. Its largest published annual count for girls was 19 in 1924. Published U.S. population figures for this spelling include 328 as a first name in 2020; a sample rank of No. 80,840 among surnames in 1990.
From Social Security birth records and U.S. Census name counts for this exact spelling. Other spellings are counted separately.
Morna’s family of names
Morna has a related form in Myrna. Morna has a related form in Momnah. Morna is an English adaptation of Muirne.
Inner ring: nicknames and forms · outer: across languages.
Nicknames & forms 2
Diminutives, pet forms, short forms and variants used alongside the name.
Across languages 1
Equivalents and cognates in other languages, plus older forms it grew from.
See also 1
Names our sources mention alongside this one. They are related in story or meaning, not forms of this name.
People named Morna
- Anne MurrayCanadian singerborn 1945
- Morna HookerBritish theologian, Professor of Divinityborn 1931
- Morna NielsenNew Zealand cricketerborn 1990
Listed by how widely each person is written about, which says nothing about the name itself.
Similar names
If you love Morna, these share its style, era, origin or sound, from outside its own family.
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