Meaning and history
Persephone is a name of unknown meaning, probably of pre-Greek origin, though it has been linked either to Greek πέρθω (pertho), “to destroy,” and φόνος (phonos), “murder,” or to an Indo-European root meaning “sheaf of corn,” giving the sense “thresher of corn.” In Greek myth, Persephone was the daughter of Demeter and Zeus; after Hades abducted her to the underworld, she was later allowed to return to the surface for part of each year, a cycle said to cause the changing seasons. Together with Demeter, she was worshipped in the Eleusinian Mysteries, secret rites celebrated at Eleusis near Athens.
20062006: 59 births, rank #2,916
2007: 64 births, rank #2,822
2008: 59 births, rank #2,957
2009: 87 births, rank #2,244
2010: 111 births, rank #1,830
20112011: 136 births, rank #1,592
2012: 143 births, rank #1,539
2013: 171 births, rank #1,362
2014: 203 births, rank #1,198
2015: 178 births, rank #1,329
20162016: 196 births, rank #1,241
2017: 226 births, rank #1,114
2018: 236 births, rank #1,075
2019: 287 births, rank #922
2020: 333 births, rank #818
20212021: 367 births, rank #775
2022: 429 births, rank #681
2023: 377 births, rank #745
2024: 383 births, rank #735
20252025: 372 births, rank #734
Persephone rose from #736 to #735 for girls between 2024 and 2025. Its highest annual birth count came in 2022, with 429 births.