Wendy - Origin and Meaning of the name

The girl name Wendy [ syll. wen-dy, we-ndy ] is pronounced WEHNDiy ^KEY. Wendy's language of origin is English, and it is predominantly used in English and German. The name was invented by the Scottish novelist J.M. Barrie for his classic children story and play Peter Pan (1904). The name was inspired by a real girl Margaret Henley, daughter of his friend; Margaret used to call Barrie 'my fwendy wendy' meaning 'my friend'. When Margaret died at the age of four in 1894, Barrie immortalized her in the story. Some scholars have suggested that Wendy could have been used as a pet form of Gwenda prior to Barrie's work.

Variant forms of Wendy include Wenda (English) and Wendi (German and English). Wend (English short form) is another variant of the name. See also the related form, Gwenda (English).

Wendy is a fairly popular baby name for girls. The name's popularity grew from the 1930s up to the 1960s; before that, it was of only very light use. At the peak of its usage in 1967, 0.654% of baby girls were named Wendy. Its ranking then was #32. The baby name has since suffered a steep decline in popularity. In 2007, it ranked at #378 with a usage of 0.041%, but it was nevertheless the most commonly used out of all girl names in its group.

Baby names that sound like Wendy include Wendi (German and English), Wanda (English, German, and Polish), Wenda (English), Wend (English), and Juanita (Spanish).

^KEY: approx pronunciation for Wendy: W as in "we (W.IY)" ; EH as in "Ed (EH.D)" ; N as in "knee (N.IY)" ; D as in "dee (D.IY)" ; IY as in "eat (IY.T)"

A famous person named Wendy is Wendy Carlos, Composer, born Walter Carlos, 14 November 1939, Pawtucket, Rhode Island.

Popularity Trend
for Wendy
from 1900 to 2007

Variant Popularity Chart
for Wendy
in 2007