Evita

Meaning of Evita

Evita is a female given name of Italian and Spanish origin, functioning as the diminutive of Eva (from Hebrew חַוָּה Chavvah, “life”), and is phonetically realized as /eˈviːta/ in Italian and /eˈβita/ in Spanish. Its cultural resonance is anchored in the figure of María Eva Duarte de Perón—widely known as Evita—and in the eponymous 1978 musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, whose subsequent West End, Broadway, and cinematic adaptations entrenched the name within the Anglo-American naming lexicon. Documentation in New York begins in 1964 with five registered births (rank 304) and charts a modest upward trajectory through the early 1980s, peaking at 27 occurrences in 1981 (rank 215) before declining to marginal usage by the mid-1980s. Phonologically, Evita exhibits an iambic stress pattern across three syllables (CV.CV.CV) with alternating vowel-consonant segments that ensure articulate pronunciation across languages, while the diminutive suffix -ita preserves morphological transparency. As a contemporary choice, Evita appeals to parents seeking a technically precise, internationally intelligible name imbued with historical gravitas and cross-cultural significance.