Madara

Meaning & origin●

Attested across 2 languages in the etymology graph.

Languages●

Language is read off each record's context, not declared by the bearer; a share is of all records for this spelling.

Other names spelled this way◐

Madara is also recorded as 4 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

• English surname7.2K records spelled Madara3 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in United States, Philippines, United Kingdom, India

  Also written Madará

• a separate surname2.3K records spelled Madara2 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in India, United States, United Kingdom

  Also written Mādāra

• French surname986 records spelled Madara7 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in France, United States, Philippines

  Also written Mådãrà, Mädära, Maͥdaͣrͫa, Mádara, Madarâ

• Japanese surname531 records spelled Madara4 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in Japan, Philippines, India, Malaysia

  Also written Madàra, Màdàrà, Màdarà

57 further groups record this spelling and are not listed here.

Grouping is the name graph's, not a register's: two spellings join a group when the evidence links them, so a group is a claim about the records rather than about the people.

Other recorded senses●

Madara is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.

• In Irish, alternative form of madra (“dog”)

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

• In Latvian, madder, bedstraw (a type of flowering plant, Rubia tinctorum)

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

• In Hungarian, third-person singular single-possession possessive of madár

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

• In bik, to be swayed (by other's opinion)

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

• In Turkish, bad, foul, unlikable

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

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.

Over time●

SE SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) — 11 years between 2010–2020. One register's own figures, never a sum across registers: two registers counting the same people would double them.

Notable people with this name●

• John Madarab. 1936USAmerican musician

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●

Register rows as of the 2026-09-12 data build · 111 rows in the corpus for this spelling.

Frequently asked questions

How common is the name Madara?

We estimate roughly 994 people bear Madara (counting its spellings and scripts) across 3 countries in our records.

In which country does Madara have the most bearers?

We estimate about 715 people bear Madara in the United States, more than in any other country in our records, where it is most often spelled madara.

Where is Madara most common?

Madara is densest in the United States, where the national register counts about 1 in 465 thousand people carrying it.

What does the name Madara mean?

Recorded meaning: topographic name from medieval Greek madara, feminine of madaros ‘bald’, in Ancient Greek also ‘humid’, ‘wet’, or from a byname, Madaras, from the same word with the suffix -as.