Olive
Meaning of Olive
Olive (pronounced OH-liv) drifts onto the ear like a breeze scented with Tuscan groves, her roots sunk deep in the Latin oliva—“olive tree”—whose silver-green leaves have whispered of peace since a dove first carried one across ancient waters; yet, even while her lineage traces mosaicked Roman roads and sun-bleached Mediterranean terraces, she feels fresh as new rain, a vintage gem polished anew by modern light, rising from near-forgotten obscurity in the late twentieth century to perch, by 2024, just outside America’s top 150 names. In her rounded vowels listeners hear not only the promise of fertile soil and pressed golden oil but also a quiet humor—after all, what other name can boast both the color of martini garnish and the heroine of classic cartoons? She carries, too, the Italian gift for effortless style: a single sprig tucked behind the ear of language, graceful yet robust, suggesting peace without preaching it, abundance without excess. For parents, choosing Olive is like planting a little tree whose shade will lengthen through the decades—a symbol of resilience, elegance, and the gentle strength that turns sunlight into fruit.
Pronunciation
British English
- Pronunced as OH-liv (/ˈəʊlɪv/)
American English
- Pronunced as OH-liv (/ˈoʊlɪv/)
U.S. Popularity Chart
States Popularity Chart
Notable People Named Olive
| Olive Elaine Morris was a Jamaican born British activist who in the 1970s led feminist, black liberation, and squatters rights campaigns, joined the British Black Panthers, and cofounded the Brixton Black Womens Group and the Organisation of Women of African and Asian Descent. |
| Olive Schreiner was a South African author and anti war activist best known for The Story of an African Farm, a groundbreaking novel on belief, independence, female ambition, and frontier life. |
| Olive Ann Oatman was an American teenager enslaved and later freed by Native Americans in the Mojave Desert who went on to lecture about her experiences. |
| Olive Marjorie Senior is a Toronto-based Jamaican poet and writer, winner of the Musgrave Gold Medal and OCM Bocas Prize, and Poet Laureate of Jamaica from 2021 to 2024. |
| Olive Ann Beech, an American aerospace pioneer, cofounded Beech Aircraft with her husband Walter in 1932, later serving as president and chairwoman and becoming the most honored woman in aviation, known as the First Lady of Aviation. |
| Mary Olive Byrne, known as Olive Richard, was the live in partner of William Moulton Marston and Elizabeth Holloway Marston and is credited as an inspiration for Wonder Woman. |
| Olive Patricia Dickason was a Metis historian and journalist, the first in Canada to earn a PhD in Indigenous history, and a pioneering author on First Nations. |
| Olive Percival - Olive May Graves Percival was a Los Angeles writer and artist who, while working as an insurance clerk, published widely and lectured on gardens, antiques, Japanese ceramics, and children's books. |
| Olive P. Lester was an American social psychologist and advocate for women who studied personality and social perception, became the first woman to chair a department at the University of Buffalo, designed a nursing curriculum there, and was named an American Psychological Association fellow in 1932. |
| Olive Higgins Prouty was an American novelist and poet best known for Stella Dallas and for exploring psychotherapy in Now Voyager. |
| Olive Muriel Pink was an Australian botanical illustrator and anthropologist who championed Aboriginal rights and spent much of her life in Central Australia. |
| Olive Eleanor Custance, known as Lady Alfred Douglas, was an English poet of the 1890s aesthetic movement, a Yellow Book contributor, and the wife of Lord Alfred Douglas. |
| Olive Risley Seward was a writer and the adopted daughter of William Henry Seward, who served as Secretary of State under Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson. |
| Olive Logan was an American actress and author, daughter of Cornelius Ambrosius Logan and Eliza Akeley. |
| Olive Fremstad was the stage name of Anna Olivia Rundquist, a celebrated Swedish American dramatic soprano who sang both mezzo soprano and soprano. |
