Amenda
A feminine name derived from the Latin word "emendatus" meaning "faultless" or "unblemished".
Name Census estimates that about 296 living Americans carry the first name Amenda. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Amenda today is around 43 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Amenda births was 1990 (16 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Amenda. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
People living today
296
~ 1 in 1,157,954 Americans
Peak year
1990
16 babies that year
Average age
43
years old
2000 SSA rank
#13,262
Tracked since 1942
Census
Amenda in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 408 people with the first name Amenda, which placed it at #23,859 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#23,859
National first-name rank
People counted
408
408 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
47.5% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Amenda
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Amenda is White at 47.5%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (17.2%) and Hispanic (16.7%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Amenda described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Amenda at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White47.5% · 194
- Asian and Pacific Islander17.2% · 70
- Hispanic or Latino16.7% · 68
- Black or African American13.2% · 54
- American Indian and Alaska Native3.2% · 13
- Two or more races2.2% · 9
Popularity
Amenda: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Amenda from the 1940s through to the 2000s, spanning 7 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1980s, with 119 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1980s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Amenda by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Amenda during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Amendas live
Origin
Meaning and history of Amenda
The name Amenda is a feminine given name of uncertain origin, with no clear consensus among scholars regarding its linguistic roots or cultural background. Some experts suggest it may be a variant or diminutive form of the name Amanda, which itself has debated origins, potentially deriving from the Latin word "amandus," meaning "worthy of love" or "lovable."
While the exact origins of Amenda remain elusive, there are records of its usage dating back to the late medieval period in certain regions of Europe. One of the earliest documented references is found in a 14th-century genealogical record from the region of Saxony, where a woman named Amenda von Gerstenberg is mentioned as a member of a noble family.
In the 16th century, the name Amenda appears in several historical records, including court documents and parish registers, primarily in areas of present-day Germany and the Netherlands. During this period, a notable figure bearing the name was Amenda von Isenburg (1528-1589), a German noblewoman and abbess of the Marienberg Abbey in Boppard.
As the name spread across Europe, it gained popularity in various forms and spellings, such as Amende, Amende, and Amenda. In the 17th century, Amenda Langhans (1635-1701) was a renowned German musician and composer known for her contributions to the development of early Baroque music.
Moving into the 18th century, Amenda Schröder (1768-1840) was a German writer and translator who gained recognition for her literary works and translations of French and English literature into German.
One of the most famous historical figures with the name Amenda was Amenda Jennings (1887-1968), an American suffragist and activist who played a significant role in the women's suffrage movement in the early 20th century, advocating for women's right to vote and gender equality.
While these examples provide glimpses into the historical usage of the name Amenda, its exact origins and cultural significance remain shrouded in mystery, leaving room for further exploration and research by linguists and historians alike.
People
Amenda + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Amenda as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with A
Other first names starting with A with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Amenda: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Amenda?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 296 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Amenda going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 1,157,954 US residents.
Is Amenda a common name?
We classify Amenda as "Very Rare". It ranks above 79.1% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 322 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Amenda most popular?
The single biggest year for Amenda was 1990, when 16 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Amenda is about 43 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Amenda in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 408 people with the name Amenda, or 0.14 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #23,859 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Amenda in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Amenda?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Amenda appears almost entirely female. Of the 412 people counted with this name, 99.8% were female and only a very small share were male. The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Amenda?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Amenda is White at 47.5%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (17.2%) and Hispanic (16.7%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Amenda most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Amenda in the 2020 Census, accounting for 47.5% (194 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Amenda in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Amenda a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Amenda in the SSA data are female. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Amenda still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Amenda in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Amenda can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How common is the name Amenda?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.