Smilla

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Female Female Name

Usage

Denmark Danish
Sweden Swedish
Norway Norwegian

Origin and Meaning

Smilla has been invented by the Danish author Peter Høeg, see 'further information' below.

Short form of Smillaaraq

Related Names

     
Miillaaraq ♀ Frequency of occurance as female name todayFrequency of occurance as male name today Greenlandic
Millaaraq ♀ Frequency of occurance as female name todayFrequency of occurance as male name today Greenlandic
Smilla ♀ Frequency of occurance as female name todayFrequency of occurance as male name today Danish Norwegian Swedish
Smillaaraq ♀ Frequency of occurance as female name todayFrequency of occurance as male name today Danish Greenlandic

Further Information

Smilla is a name invented by the Danish author Peter Høeg. It is the name of the main character in his novel Frøken Smillas fornemmelse for sne (1992; English: Smilla's sense of snow).

Here is a quote from the book where he describes the origin of the name:

Det år, jeg blev født, rejste min mor til Vestgrønland, og derfra havde hun kvindenavnet Millaaraq med hjem. Fordi det mindede Moritz om det danske mild, der ikke fandtes i ordbogen over hans og min mors kærlighedsforhold, fordi han ønskede at underkaste alt grønlandsk en transformation, der kunne gøre det europæisk og bekendt, og fordi jeg efter sigende skal have leet til ham - spædbarnets ubegrænsede tillid, der kommer af, at det endnu ikke véd hvad der venter - så enedes de om Smillaaraq, som af det slid, som tiden underkaster os alle, forkortedes til Smilla.

So Smilla's Greenlandic mother Ane had heard the name Millaaraq in West Greenland. The name reminded Smilla's Danish father Moritz of the Danish word mild (Danish mild, pron. MEEL(D), = 'mild'), and because his little daughter had smiled to him (Danish smile, pron. SMEE-leh, = 'to smile', they changed the name to Smillaaraq. The short form of that is Smilla.

The original Greenlandic meaning of the name Millaaraq is not given in the book. According to the Greenlandic site Oqaasileriffik [[1]] the correct spelling of the name is Miillaaraq (one more i), and it could be related to the word millalaarpoq, which means 'humming (of an insect)', which makes Miillaaraq mean something like 'little humming one'.

Statistics

Name count per country
CountryFemale ♀ Male ♂Commonness
Sweden Sweden[1] # 1023 0
Denmark Denmark[2] # 726 0
Norway Norway[3] # 13 0
Finland Finland[4] & 27 0
  #: count of main first name only
  &: count of both main and additional first names
Name counts are approximate as statistics normally is not published for names given to less than 3 or 5 persons per country.

 

Recent statistics trend[1][2][3][4]:Name statistics for Smilla(f)


Sources: [1] [2] [3] [4]

References

  1. ↑ Statistiska Centralbyrån, National statistics office of Sweden, http://www.scb.se/
  2. ↑ Danmarks Statistik, National statistics office of Denmark, http://www.dst.dk
  3. ↑ Statistisk Sentralbyrå, National statistics office of Norway, http://www.ssb.no
  4. ↑ Väestörekisterikeskus, National Population Register Centre of Finland, http://www.vrk.fi
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