Girl · Old English, through a place name
Kimberly
Say it: KIM-bur-lee
Meaning
From the South African town of Kimberley, named after Lord Kimberley, whose title comes from an English place name, Old English Cyneburg (a woman's name) + lēah 'clearing'.
Certainscholars agree on this meaning.
First given to some boys around the Boer War, it became a top American girls' name in the 1960s and 1970s.
Its wave through time
A fashion of the 1960s
In the United States
- 844,244 babies given this name since 1933
- At its height in 1967, about 1 in 50 girls
- 1,548 babies in 2020
Through the ages
Used by
The family of the name
Other spellings: Kimberley, Kimberlee
Famous bearers
- Kimberly Williams-Paisley, US actress
Names worth a look
Where this comes from
- United States Social Security birth records, 1880 to today source
- United States Social Security birth records, 1880 to today source
Meanings and histories are compiled from the study of names and their languages and checked by a second review.
Meanings and histories are drawn from the study of names and their languages, each with a confidence rating; popularity figures come from official birth records. Name histories are a living field: if you know of a correction, we would be glad to hear it.