- Origin: English
- Gender: Female
- First Use: 1857
- Pron: (so-FEE-lee-ah)
This poetic beauty seems to have first occurred in British records in the mid 19th-century, there is a birth record for an Emily Sophelia Jefferis in Somerset, England from 1857. There are several records for English women who have this as a first name from the late 1800s onwards.
It is probably just an elaborate form of Sophia or perhaps a combination of Sophia and Ophelia. It has experienced very rare use in the U.K., about 5 baby girls were given this name in 2024.
Sources