Elena

[angeltop]

Thoughts please, pronounced el lay na

Love it and was my girls name of choice (had Ds's!).

It's a Spanish/Italian/Greek/Romanian name so if you are fine for English people to butcher the pronunciation throughout your child's life...

I have a foreign name and have given up trying to correct people as even when I do correct them they still revert back to their old way of pronunciation it.

I can’t quote and quote, but for everyone querying why anyone would pronounce Eleanor and Elena same, not everyone emphasises the R in Eleanor. To me, and my niece Eleanor, the “or”is like the “a” of retina. It does not rhyme with door.

I love it and would pronounce it El le nah but El lay nah is lovely also No idea why some pronounce it the same as Eleanor .They are two totally different names and pronounced differently.

Ive only ever heard Eleanor pronounced El le nah! How else do people pronouce it?

I'd see them as interchangeable...

Eleanor I mean!

I love it but for similar reasons avoided Helena because I know it would get pronounced Hell-en-a instead of Hel-ay-na

You could go for Eleni, the Greek version, pronounced El-ay-ni

Love it.

@merryhouse oh I see!! I’m Scottish and Eleanor is reasonably common here (at least in a slightly older generation) and we roll our Rs so to me Elena and Eleanor are quite distinct but I guess it depends on the accent. My main concern was the El-en-a v El-ay-na versions!

The ones I have known (in UK) all pronounce it your way, ell-ay-na. I don't think you'd have pronunciation issues.

I love Elena

I know an Allana who pronounces it Al-ay-na.... although instinctively I want to say Alarna...

Pemba my experience is completely opposite! (Also uk.) I wonder if it's regional.

I love it. I also like Adela.

Such a lovely name. I know an adult one and she's beautiful inside and out so I have very good associations with it!

Eleena it's pronounced in Russian

I have a Russian client and she's a beautiful lady inside and out.
Love the name @angeltop

I like Elena.

All the Elenas I know are Elen-ah.

I've never heard it pronounced with a LAY sound . Wouldn't that be spelled Eléna?

And Eleanor is Elen-OR

Eleanor is usually pronounced Ellen-uh (see Eleanor Rigby) but Americans say Ellen-or and apparently Scots too!

I've only ever heard Eleanor as Ell-eh-nurr or Ell-eh-nore

I think Elena is a lovely name. I would pronounce it the way you said.

The pronunciation of Eleanor depends on whether you have a rhotic or non-rhotic accent.

Love it.

Thanks all, daddy is Italian with large extended family so most of the time in house will be pronounced beautifully.

I'm a bit confused now, because I thought the Italian pronunciation was NOT ell-ay-na? I'm getting this from watching 'My Beautiful Friend', based on the Elena Ferrente novel (did I spell that right?). It's filmed in Italy, with Italian actors, and the character of Elena is definitely said as 'ell-ENN-a, not ell-ay-na. It's set around Naples I think, so possibly regional?

I assumed that Ell-ay-na was the Spanish way.