Meaning and history
Mélissa is a name meaning “bee” in Greek. In Greek mythology, it was the name of a daughter of Procles and an epithet for various Greek nymphs and priestesses; according to the early Christian writer Lactantius, it was also the name of the sister of the nymph Amalthea, with whom she cared for the young Zeus. The name later appears in Ludovico Ariosto’s 1532 poem Orlando Furioso as the fairy who helps Ruggiero escape from the witch Alcina, and as an English given name it has been used since the 18th century.
20062006: 2,893 births, rank #117
2007: 2,505 births, rank #137
2008: 2,517 births, rank #134
2009: 2,338 births, rank #137
2010: 1,951 births, rank #156
20112011: 1,709 births, rank #184
2012: 1,772 births, rank #178
2013: 1,592 births, rank #202
2014: 1,509 births, rank #224
2015: 1,283 births, rank #253
20162016: 1,236 births, rank #260
2017: 1,170 births, rank #274
2018: 1,117 births, rank #299
2019: 933 births, rank #340
2020: 887 births, rank #349
20212021: 836 births, rank #372
2022: 823 births, rank #379
2023: 744 births, rank #411
2024: 826 births, rank #379
20252025: 747 births, rank #419
Melissa moved from #379 to #420 for girls between 2024 and 2025. Its highest annual birth count came in 1979, with 34,050 births.