Clara (given name)

Clara or Klara is a female given name. It is the feminine form of the Late Latin name Clarus which meant "clear, bright, famous". Various early male Christian saints were named Clarus; the feminine form became popular after the 13th-century Saint Clare of Assisi (called Chiara in Italian), one of the followers of Saint Francis, who renounced her privileged background and founded the order of Poor Clares.

Clare was the main English form of the name used in the Middle Ages, but the Latin spelling Clara became more popular in the 19th century.

Glara is a related Kurdish name with a common origin, meaning "vision or brightness".

Given name

 * Clara Alm (born 1996), Swedish footballer
 * Clara Amfo (born 1984), British broadcaster and presenter
 * Clara Arthur (1858–1929), American suffragist
 * Klara Ashrafyan (1924–1999), Soviet Indologist
 * Clara Ayres (1880–1917), American nurse during the First World War
 * Clara Barton (1821–1912), pioneer American teacher, nurse and humanitarian
 * Clara Doty Bates (1838–1895), American author
 * Clara Nettie Bates (1876–1966), American editor, writer, clubwoman
 * Clara Bancroft Beatley (1858–1923), American educator, lecturer, author
 * Clara Beyers (1880–1950), American actress
 * Clara Bindi (1927–2022), Italian actress
 * Clara Blandick (1876–1962), American actress
 * Clara Bonde (1806–1899), Swedish courtier and royal favourite
 * Clara Bow (1905–1965), American actress
 * Clara Louise Burnham (1854–1927), American novelist
 * Clara Butt (1872–1936), English contralto
 * Clara Calamai (1909–1998), Italian actress
 * Klara Castanho (born 2000), Brazilian actress
 * Klára Červenková (1873–1945), Czech geographer
 * Clara Germana Cele, South African woman stated in 1906 to have suffered demonic possession
 * Clara Marguerite Christian (1895–1964), first black woman to study at the University of Edinburgh
 * Clara Chung (born 1987), Korean-American singer/guitarist also known by her stage name, Clara C
 * Clara Rankin Coblentz (1863–1933), American social reformer
 * Clara Novello Davies (1861–1943), Welsh singer
 * Clara Eliot (1896–1976), economist
 * Clara Faragó (1905–1944), Hungarian chess master
 * Clara Shortridge Foltz (1849–1934), first female attorney on the Pacific Coast, suffrage leader, founder of the public defender movement
 * Clara Friedman (1920–2015), Israeli chess player
 * Clara Grima (born 1971), Spanish mathematician
 * Clara Haskil (1895–1960), Romanian classical pianist, renowned as an interpreter of the classical and early romantic repertoire
 * Clara H. Hazelrigg (1861–1937), American author, educator and social reformer
 * Clara Henriette (née Sanchez, born 1983), French cyclist
 * Clara de Hirsch (born 1833–1899), Belgian businesswoman and philanthropist
 * Clara Cleghorn Hoffman (1831–1908), American educator and temperance reformer
 * Clara Horton (1904–1976), American actress
 * Clara Hughes (born 1972), Canadian athlete who has won medals in both the summer and winter Olympics
 * Clara Immerwahr (1870–1915), German chemist, first wife of Fritz Haber
 * Clara-Jumi Kang (born 1987), South Korean-German musician
 * Clara Louise Kellogg (1842–1916), American soprano
 * Klára B. Kokas (1907–1962), Hungarian art director
 * Klára Koukalová (born 1982), Czech tennis player
 * Klara Kristalova (born 1967), Czech sculptor
 * Clara Lachmann (1864–1920), Danish-Swedish patron of the arts
 * Clara Landsberg (1873–1966), American educator
 * Clara Larter (1847–1936), English botanist
 * Clara Ledesma (1924–1999), Dominican artist
 * Clara Lee (born 1985; real name Lee Sung-min), South Korean actress
 * Clara Lemlich (1886–1982), union organizer, consumer activist, member of the Communist Party
 * Clara López (born 1950), Colombian politician
 * Klara Luchko (1925–2005), Soviet actress
 * Clara Luper (1923–2011), American civil rights leader
 * Clara Mamet (born 1994), American actress
 * Clara Maniu (1842–1929), Romanian feminist
 * Clara Milburn (1883–1961), British diarist
 * Klara Milch (1891–1970), Austrian swimmer
 * Clara Moneke (born 1998), Brazilian actress and model
 * Clara Morgane (born 1981), French porn star and singer
 * Clara Mulholland (1849–1934), Irish writer
 * Klara Myrén (born 1991), Swedish ice hockey player
 * Clara Ng (born 1973), Indonesian writer
 * Clara Novello (1818–1908), English soprano
 * Clara Nunes (1942–1983), Brazilian singer
 * Klara Izabella Pacowa (1631–1685), politically active Polish court official
 * Clara Paget (born 1988), British model and actress
 * Clara Peeters (circa 1594–1657), 17th century Flemish painter
 * Clara Petacci (1912–1945), mistress of Benito Mussolini
 * Clara Pinto-Correia (born 1960), Portuguese novelist
 * Clara Reeve (1729–1807), English novelist
 * Clara Rockmore (1911–1998), Lithuanian virtuosa of the theremin
 * Klara Rumyanova (1929–2004), Soviet actress, voice of Cheburashka
 * Clara Sanchez (born 1955), Spanish novelist
 * Clara Schønfeld (1856–1938), Danish actress
 * Clara Schumann (1819–1896), German pianist, composer
 * Clara Segura (born 1974), Catalan actress
 * Clara Soccini (born 1999), Italian singer
 * Clara Sorrenti (born 1994), Canadian Twitch streamer and transgender activist, known online as Keffals
 * Clara Sosa (born 1993), Paraguayan model, television personality and beauty queen
 * Clara Southern (1860–1940), Australian artist
 * Clara Harrison Stranahan (1831–1905), American author, college founder
 * Clara Tauson (born 2002), Danish tennis player
 * Clara Tott (1440–1520), German singer
 * Clara Tschudi (1856–1945), Norwegian writer
 * Clara Augusta Jones Trask (1839–1805), American writer
 * Clara Ursin (1828–1890), Norwegian (originally Danish) stage actress and opera singer
 * Clara Webster (1821–1844), British dancer
 * Clara Weekes (1852–1937), Australian educator, suffragist, labor leader and pacifist
 * Clara Belle Williams (1885–1994), first African-American graduate of New Mexico State University
 * Clara Woltering (born 1983), German handball goalkeeper
 * Clara Kimball Young (1890–1960), American actress
 * Clara Zetkin (1857–1933), German Marxist theorist and women's rights activist

Animals with this name

 * Clara the Rhinoceros, female Indian rhinoceros who became famous during 17 years of touring Europe in the mid-18th century
 * Clara the Cow, live mascot in Greek Mega Channel's entertainment programme Poly tin Kyriaki (Too Much on Sunday)

Fictional characters

 * Clara, the protagonist in Tchaikovsky's classic ballet The Nutcracker
 * Clara, the protagonist of the 2001 animated film Barbie in the Nutcracker
 * Clara, a character from the 1992 musical The Muppet Christmas Carol
 * Clara (Mirbeau), the main character in Octave Mirbeau's 1899 novel The Torture Garden
 * Clara in Bob Dylan's 1975 surrealist film Renaldo and Clara
 * Clara in E. T. A. Hoffmann's short story "The Sandman"
 * Aunt Clara, a recurring character in the 1960s television series Bewitched
 * Princess Clara, in the American animated television series Drawn Together
 * Clara, protagonist in Elizabeth Spencer's novella The Light in the Piazza and in the book's film and musical adaptation
 * Clara, the main antagonist in the 1972 animated film Snoopy Come Home
 * Clara, a playable character from the gacha game Honkai: Star Rail
 * Clara Belle in the video game MySims
 * Clara Brereton, impoverished niece of Lady Denham in Jane Austen’s unfinished novel Sanditon (1817)
 * Clara Clayton, wife of Doc Brown in the Back to the Future film series
 * Clara Cluck, a recurring character in Disney's Mickey Mouse cartoons
 * Clara de Clare, a rich woman who becomes a nun in Walter Scott's poem Marmion
 * Clara Durrant in Virginia Woolf's novel Jacob's Room
 * Clara Oswald, companion of the Eleventh and Twelfth Doctor in the British science-fiction television series Doctor Who
 * Clara, one of two clowns that are playthings of the titular villain in the Doctor Who story The Celestial Toymaker
 * Clara Sesemann, in Johanna Spyri's novel Heidi
 * Clara del Valle Trueba, the clairvoyant key female figure of Isabel Allende's novel The House of the Spirits
 * Clara Yotsuba, a.k.a. Alice Yotsuba, a main character in Glitter Force Doki Doki/DokiDoki! Pretty Cure