Cassandra

/kə.ˈsæn.dɹə/

The name Cassandra comes from the Greek Kassandra, possibly derived from kekasmai (“to excel, to shine”) combined with andr- (“man”), giving a sense of “she who shines among men.” An alternative links it to the verb kassasthai, “to entangle.”

US Rank 2024

No. 613

Births

485

In Greek mythology Cassandra was a daughter of King Priam of Troy, gifted with prophecy by Apollo but cursed so that no one would believe her.

Her warnings about the Trojan Horse went unheeded, and the phrase “a Cassandra” has entered English as a byword for an ignored prophet. Aeschylus dramatised her fate in Agamemnon.

What the name Cassandra means

Cassandra ranks No. 613 in the US with 485 births. It peaked in 1990 at No. 49 with an impressive 7,054 births, making it one of the top 50 names of the late 1980s baby boom before a sustained decline over 3 decades.

The name was revived in English literature by the heroines of Christa Wolf’s Cassandra (1983) and Dodie Smith’s I Capture the Castle (1948).

In television, Cassandra features in Doctor Who, Tangled: The Series and the animated Rugrats, keeping it visible across generations.

At 3 syllables with stress on the second, Cassandra has a stately, rolling cadence. The double s gives it a distinctive hiss at the centre, flanked by a hard k opening and a soft -dra close.

The nickname options are generous: Cass, Cassie, Sandra and Sandy all derive naturally. This flexibility has historically been one of the name’s strengths, allowing formal and casual registers to coexist.

Although it peaked in the US decades ago, Cassandra retains strong recognition and cultural weight. Parents choosing it today are selecting a name that carries millennia of literary resonance without feeling overexposed in the current generation.