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Genna

Girl name · 88 babies recorded · 1974–2025

Genna: 88 babies born in Scotland since 1974, given to girls, peaking at 13 births in 1984.

Few people realise that Genna is most often a twentieth-century respelling of Gemma, the Italian word for "gem" or "precious stone" — a name that became fashionable in English-speaking countries thanks to Saint Gemma Galgani, a beloved early 1900s Italian mystic. Genna also appears occasionally as a short form of Genevieve or a feminine form of the Welsh name Gen, meaning "white wave" or "fair one." In Scotland, the spelling Genna has grown quietly popular since the 1970s, sometimes treated as a variant of Jenna, which itself derives from Guinevere. Actress Genna de Batista brought the name into the public eye in the 1990s as a performer on British television. The name shares its jewel-like root with the town of Gemona in northern Italy.