Prudence
given name · Latin script
Meaning, in English: from Lat prudentia ‘prudence’, a woman’s name; first attested Robertus filius Prudence 1206 P (Sr)
Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Prudence is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in South Africa than in any other country.
- ZASouth Africa≈1 in 2.5K(inferred from the name graph)
- AUAustralia≈1 in 14K
- USUnited States1 in 84K
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- South Africa (inferred from the name graph)
- 2 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 292 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 2.5K (inferred from the name graph)
≈22,000 people, est.
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
South Africa, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records, and ○ marks a model's transliteration; click a spelling to open its page.
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
from Lat prudentia ‘prudence’, a woman’s name; first attested Robertus filius Prudence 1206 P (Sr)
Sources 1
- A Dictionary of English Surnames
Attested across 5 languages in the etymology graph.
How Prudence is read(measured from records)
Prudence is one spelling over 3 language communities, and the dictionaries record it differently in 2 of them. Each row is what a source recorded for that language, beside the share of this name’s records the language holds. No single row is the name’s meaning.
- English64%
from Lat prudentia ‘prudence’, a woman’s name; first attested Robertus filius Prudence 1206 P (Sr)
as a nameA Dictionary of English Surnames
The quality or state of being prudent: circumspection and good judgment in knowing how best to act; (countable, archaic) an instance of this.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
- Swahili16%
No dictionary in our sources glosses Prudence in Swahili.
- French7.7%
Latin virtue name from prudentia, meaning 'foresight, wisdom'.
as a nameLe grand guide des prénoms (Enfant - Education)
prudence, caution, care
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Origine latine, « sagesse ».
as a nameLe grand guide des prénoms (Enfant - Education)
The share is ours — how much of this name’s records each language holds. The sense beside it is the source’s, quoted and credited, including where it names a gender. We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Prudence counted together with the spellings and other-language forms grouped with it. Where a register counted another spelling, the row names it.
Sorted by bearers: national registers' counts, and Mondonomo's estimates (≈, est.) where no register counts.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ZA South Africa | #488 | ≈22,000 est. | ≈1 in 2.5K | — | Prudence | 61 |
| CN China | — | ≈17,000 est. | ≈1 in 84K | — | Prudence | 10 |
| KE Kenya | — | ≈12,000 est. | ≈1 in 4.4K | — | Prudence | 15 |
| NG Nigeria | — | ≈5,000 est. | ≈1 in 43K | listed | Prudence | 38 |
| US United States | — | 3,983 | 1 in 84K | 4K | Prudence | 292 |
| TZ Tanzania | — | ≈3,000 est. | ≈1 in 19K | — | Prudence | 14 |
| AU Australia | — | ≈1,800 est. | ≈1 in 14K | 3 | Prudence | 142 |
| GY Guyana | — | 48 | 1 in 16K | 48 | — | 4 |
Exact figures are national registers' own counts, while figures marked ≈ and est. are Mondonomo’s estimates, counted from our sources and calibrated against those registers; hover one for how far to trust it in that country. A dash means neither exists.
Registers cited: Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex; Australian national given names (aggregated state BDM); the wgnd-ng-names register; Guyana — Official List of Electors July 2025. Figures without a register are Mondonomo estimates; see Methodology.
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).
Other recorded senses(measured from records)
Prudence is also recorded in one other lexicon, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
Originally a medieval form of the Latin name Pradentia, a feminine form of Pradentius, from pradens ‘provident’.
as a nameA concise dictionary of first names
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- Prudence Crandallb. 1803USCivil rights pioneer, educator, temperance advocate, Connecticut's official State Heroine (1803-1890)
- Prudence Hewardb. 1896CACanadian artist (1896-1947)
- Prudence Fentonb. 1901USAmerican film and television producer
- Prudence Hymanb. 1914GBBritish ballerina and actress (1914-1995)
- Adrienne Kennawayb. 1945NZnot in their usual nameillustrator and children's book author
- Prudence Bushnellb. 1946USAmerican diplomat
- Prudence Farrowb. 1948USAmerican film producer
- Prudence Murdochb. 1958AUdaughter of Rupert Murdoch
- Prudence Liewb. 1964CNHong Kong singer and actress
- Prudence Sekgodisob. 2002ZASouth African middle-distance runner (born 2002)
The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 56 sources across 35 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 4K | #4,611 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2025 | 89 | — |
| GY Guyana | Guyana — Official List of Electors July 2025 | 2025 | 48 | #546 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 31 | #4,611 |
| AU Australia | Australian national given names (aggregated state BDM) | 1991 | 3 | — |
| AU Australia | AU state BDM — consolidated top baby names (NSW + SA + QLD) | 2015 | 1 | — |
| AU Australia | SA BDM — Popular baby names South Australia (1944–present) | 2015 | 1 | — |
| AU Australia | SA BDM — Popular baby names South Australia (1944–present) | 1976 | 1 | — |
| NG Nigeria | WGND 2.0 — Nigeria given names | — | — | — |
Reference works 3
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- Wikipedia given-name tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- What does the name Prudence mean, and where does it come from?
- from Lat prudentia ‘prudence’, a woman’s name; first attested Robertus filius Prudence 1206 P (Sr) Recorded by A Dictionary of English Surnames.
- Is Prudence a male or female name?
- Prudence is a female name in our records. Opposite-gender entries fall within the cross-gender noise we measure in the source data, so we don't report them as usage.
- In which country does Prudence have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 22 thousand people named Prudence in South Africa, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled prudence.
- How common is the name Prudence?
- In the United States, the national register counted 3,983 people named Prudence in 2020, about 1 in 84 thousand residents.
- How common is Prudence compared with other names?
- In South Africa, Prudence is the 488th most common given name of 189,620 given names recorded there.
What do you want to know about Prudence?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/prudenceThe payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. It takes a free API key (1,000 requests a day), which returns what this page shows everyone; the full country table, every register citation and the year-by-year series come with a licensed key, as does bulk access.
About this data
measured from records inferred from the name graph machine-generated
These figures come from the data snapshot of and will change as it is rebuilt.
Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.
Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.
Cite this page Mondonomo, “Prudence” — the 488th most common given name in South Africa. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.