Baby name
FADING
🇬🇧 🇺🇸 🇩🇪 Gretchen
/GREH · chen/
Meaning
“Pearl”
German diminutive of Margarete, from Greek 'margarites' meaning pearl; immortalized as the innocent heroine in Goethe's 'Faust'.
Nicknames
greta · gretel
Vibe
strongelegant
How it ages.
Peaked in the US in the mid-20th century; in Germany feels like a folk diminutive rather than a formal name.
The cultural moment.
Common in the US from the 1940s-1970s; rare in Germany as a formal name, used mostly as a diminutive.