Fanny is a feminine given name. Its origins include diminutives of the French name Frances meaning "free one", and of the name "Estefanía", a Spanish version of Stephanie, meaning "crown". [citation needed]

Fanny
Other names
Related namesFrances, Fannie, Stephanie

The popularity of the name has been steadily declining since the end of the 19th century.[1] In British English, fanny has been a vulgar slang term for vagina or vulva since the 1830s. In American English, fanny is a slang term for the buttocks in use since World War I.[2] In New Zealand, the Registrar of Births will no longer accept the name for a baby's birth certificate.[3]

People

edit

Given name

edit

Pet form of Frances

edit

Others

edit
  • Fanny Altendorfer, Austrian luger who competed in the late 1920s
  • Fanny Anitùa (1887–1969), Mexican contralto opera singer
  • Baroness Franziska Fanny von Arnstein (1758–1818), leader of society in Vienna, born Vögele Itzig
  • Fanny Balbuk (1840–1906), prominent Noongar Whadjuk woman who lived in Perth, Western Australia
  • Fanny Amelia Bayfield (died 1891), English-born Canadian artist and educator
  • Fanny de Beauharnais (1737–1813), French lady of letters and salon holder, born Marie-Anne-Françoise Mouchard
  • Fanny Bendixen (1820–1899), hotelier and saloon keeper during the gold-rush period in British Columbia
  • Fanny Blood (1758–1785), English illustrator and educator and longtime friend of Mary Wollstonecraft
  • Fanny Bornedal (born 2000), Danish actress
  • Fanny Bouvet (born 1994), French diver
  • Fanny Brennan (1921–2001), French-American surrealist painter
  • Fanny Britt (born 1977), Canadian playwright and translator living in Quebec
  • Fanny Buitrago (born 1943), Colombian fiction writer and playwright
  • Fanny Cadeo (born 1970), Italian showgirl, model, television personality and singer
  • Fanny Calder (1838–1923), promoter of education in domestic subjects in Liverpool
  • Fanny Carby (1925–2002), British actress
  • Fanny Carlsen, German screenwriter of the silent era
  • Fanny Carrió (fl. 1879–1949), Uruguayan liberal feminist
  • Fanny Cerrito (1817–1909), Italian ballet dancer and choreographer born Francesca Cerrito
  • Fanny Chamberlain (1825–1905), wife of Joshua Chamberlain
  • Fanny Churberg (1845–1892), Finnish landscape painter
  • Fanny Clamagirand (born 1984), French classical violinist
  • Fanny Colonna (1934–2014), French-Algerian sociologist and anthropologist
  • Fanny Corbaux (1812–1883), British painter and biblical commentator
  • Fanny Cornforth (1835–1909), model and mistress of painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti, real name thought to be Sarah Cox
  • Fanny Corri-Paltoni, English operatic soprano active in Europe between 1818 and 1835
  • Fanny Cradock (1909–1994), English restaurant critic, television cook and writer
  • Fanny Currey (1848–1917), Irish horticulturalist and watercolour painter
  • Fanny Deakin (1883–1968), politician from Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, England
  • Fanny Deberghes (born 1994), French swimmer
  • Fanny Duberly (1829–1903), English soldier's wife who wrote a journal of her experiences
  • Fanny Carter Edson (1887–1952), American petroleum geologist
  • Fanny Fern (1811–1872), pen name of Sara Willis, American newspaper columnist, humorist, novelist, and author of children's stories
  • Fanny Garrido (1846–1917), Spanish writer
  • Fanny Chambers Gooch (1842–1913), American author
  • Fanny Heldy (1888–1973), Belgian operatic soprano born Marguerite Virginie Emma Clémentine Deceuninck
  • Fanny Bury Palliser (1805–1878), English writer on art, and lace
  • Fanny Addison Pitt (1847–1937), English actress
  • Fanny Rubio (born 1949), Spanish academic
  • Fanny Cochrane Smith (1834–1905), Aboriginal Tasmanian
  • Princess Fanny von Starhemberg (1875–1943), Austrian politician born Franziska Gräfin von Larisch-Mönnich
  • Fanny Tarnow (1779–1862), German writer born Franziska Christiane Johanna Friederike Tarnow
  • Frederick Fanny Walden (1888–1949), English footballer and cricketer

Fictional characters

edit

Animals

edit
  • Fanny (elephant) (born 1940s), female Asian elephant who spent the majority of her life in a small zoo in Pawtucket, Rhode Island

References

edit
  1. ^ Fanny - Given name information and usage statistics. In: baby-girl-names.org
  2. ^ "The Grammarphobia Blog: Jane Austen's "Fanny"". 20 February 2017.
  3. ^ Thomas, Grace (2024-01-23). "New Zealand's declined baby names of 2023". Newshub. Retrieved 2024-01-24.