Is Walpurgis the same name as Walburga?

Yes. Walpurgis is another form of Walburga's name, as is Waltpurde, and the Roman Martyrology commemorates her on 1 May.

Is Winifred a saint's name?

Yes. Winifred, also spelled Winefride, is venerated as a Welsh saint with a pilgrimage spring at Holywell, although Behind the Name calls her likely legendary and her Lives were written centuries after her death.

Was Saint Wilgefortis a real person?

The Catholic Encyclopedia calls her a fabulous saint and explains her story as a misreading of robed crucifixes copied from the Volto Santo of Lucca. Her feast was kept from the fifteenth century, but the woman herself probably never lived.

Are Willow, Wendy and Winona Christian names?

Not through a biblical woman or a saint. Behind the Name's biblical list has none of them, and the online lists that label them Christian cite no saint or passage.

What Are Christian Girl Names Starting With W and Their Meanings?

Walburga, Werburgh, Winifred and Wilgefortis are the W saints families usually meet, and their records run from a dated eighth-century abbess to a figure the Catholic Encyclopedia calls fabulous. No W name appears in Behind the Name's biblical list, so all four reach the letter through later church history.

Walburga's life has dates, named relatives and texts credited to her, while the Catholic Encyclopedia says Wilgefortis's story probably grew from a misread crucifix.

Winifred and Werburgh sit between those two. Winifred is known through Lives written centuries after her death and a well still visited at Holywell, and Werburgh through a dated royal family and her relics at Chester.

Willow, Wendy and Winona, common on modern lists, are not in Behind the Name's list of biblical feminine names, and the lists that call them Christian name no saint or passage for them.

Quick Facts

Women with W names in the Bible: None in Behind the Name's list of 162 feminine biblical names
Best-documented W saint: Walburga, abbess of Heidenheim, about 710 to 777
Legend with a living pilgrimage: Winifred, at the spring of Holywell
Dated royal abbess: Werburgh, patroness of Chester, died 699 or 700
Saint the Catholic Encyclopedia calls fabulous: Wilgefortis, also called Uncumber

Are there any biblical girl names starting with W?

No. None of the 162 entries in Behind the Name's list of feminine biblical names begins with W.

The Christian W names for girls therefore come from later saints: three women whose lives the Catholic Encyclopedia places in seventh- and eighth-century England, Wales and Germany, and one figure whose existence the same encyclopedia doubts.

Since no passage of scripture anchors these names, they differ mainly in how much of each saint's life can be dated.

Who was Saint Walburga, and is Walpurgis her name?

Walburga has the firmest record of the four W saints. The Catholic Encyclopedia places her birth in Devonshire about 710 and her death at Heidenheim, in Germany, on 25 February 777.

Her family is recorded with her: her father was St Richard, a West Saxon under-king, her mother Winna was a sister of St Boniface, and her brothers were St Willibald and St Winibald.

She became abbess of Heidenheim and governed the monks' house there as well as her own community of nuns.

The same encyclopedia credits her with a Life of her brother Winibald and a Latin account of Willibald's travels, and it calls her "the first female author of England and Germany." That authorship claim is the 1912 encyclopedia's own.

Her relics were moved to Eichstätt around 870. The encyclopedia records the devotional tradition that a fluid, which it calls "precious oil or dew," flows from them.

Walpurgis is another form of her name, as is Waltpurde, and the Roman Martyrology commemorates her on 1 May. French records give the name as Vaubourg or Falbourg, and the Perche region as Gauburge.

Behind the Name derives Walburga from Old German walt, meaning power or authority, and burg, meaning fortress. It describes her as an eighth-century Anglo-Saxon saint who did missionary work in Germany.

What happened to Winifred at Holywell?

In the legend, a man named Caradoc beheads Winifred after she refuses him, and a spring rises where her head falls. Her uncle, St Beuno, restores her to life, and a thin white circle remains on her neck.

The Catholic Encyclopedia gives her birth at Holywell about 600 and her death at Gwytherin on 3 November 660, and names her mother as Wenlo, Beuno's sister.

The written Lives come much later. One is attributed to St Elwy, and another was compiled about 1130 by Robert, prior of Shrewsbury, nearly five centuries after the death date the encyclopedia gives.

Behind the Name calls her a "likely legendary" seventh-century martyr. Her cult is better attested than her biography: the healing spring at Holywell is still a pilgrimage site, and the same source says she has been more widely venerated in England than in Wales.

Naming a daughter Winifred connects her with a devotion that still draws pilgrims, while the beheading and restoration remain legend recorded centuries after the dates it describes.

Behind the Name traces Winifred to the Latin Winifreda, possibly from Welsh Gwenfrewi and possibly shaped by the Old English name Winfred, and records English use since at least the sixteenth century. The encyclopedia spells it Winefride, the later English form, and records that the name was known in Wales before the conquest as Guenevra.

Werburgh of Chester has a dated royal record

Werburgh was a Mercian princess. The Catholic Encyclopedia names her father as King Wulfhere of Mercia and her mother as St Ermenilda.

She served as abbess of Weedon, Trentham, Hanbury, Minster in Sheppey and Ely, and she died at Trentham on 3 February 699 or 700.

In 875 her body was moved to Chester "through fear of the Danes," and she became the city's patroness.

The name also appears as Wereburga, Wereburg and, in French, Verbourg.

Was Wilgefortis a real saint?

Probably not as a historical woman. The Catholic Encyclopedia calls her "a fabulous female saint" and lists other names for the same figure, including Uncumber, Kummernis and Liberata.

In her legend she is a princess who prays to be disfigured, grows a beard, and is crucified by her father.

The encyclopedia traces the story to copies of the Volto Santo of Lucca, a crucifix that shows Christ clothed in a long tunic. On that explanation, people who saw a robed, bearded figure on a cross took it for a crucified woman with a beard.

Her name has two proposed explanations. Tradition reads it as virgo fortis, "strong virgin," while the scholar Schnürer proposed a corruption of Hilge Vartz, "Holy Face," which would tie the name to the Lucca image itself.

Her feast appears in breviaries and martyrologies from the fifteenth century, on 20 July. A list that calls Wilgefortis a saint is therefore reporting a real medieval devotion, but on the encyclopedia's account the woman at its centre most likely never lived.

How the four W saints compare, and where Willow and Wendy fit

If a documented life matters most to you, Walburga and Werburgh are the strongest W choices, because both have dated deaths, named parents and recorded relic histories.

Winifred suits a family drawn to a devotion that is still practised, with the understanding that her story is legend written down centuries later. Wilgefortis carries the most caution, since her own name may come from a title of the Lucca crucifix.

W girl names by strength of record
Name	What the record rests on	Strength	Caution
Walburga (Walpurgis)	Dated life, about 710 to 777, named family, writing credited to her in 1912	Firm	Authorship credit comes from the 1912 encyclopedia
Werburgh	Royal parents, death in 699 or 700, relics moved to Chester in 875	Firm	Spellings vary, including Wereburga and Verbourg
Winifred (Winefride)	Lives attributed to St Elwy and to Robert of Shrewsbury, about 1130; pilgrimage spring at Holywell	Cult firm, life legendary	The beheading story is legend, not dated history
Wilgefortis	Feast in breviaries from the fifteenth century	Weak	Called fabulous; probably a misread Lucca crucifix
Wendy, Willow, Winona	Modern name lists	No biblical woman	Lists that call them Christian name no saint
Wilhelmina, Wilma, Whitney	Modern name lists	No biblical woman	Lists that call them Christian name no saint

Wendy, Willow, Winona, Whitney, Wilma and Wilhelmina appear often on online lists of Christian W names. None of them is in Behind the Name's list of biblical feminine names, and the lists that call them Christian name no saint or passage for them.