Tamara (given name)

Tamara is a feminine given name of Hebrew, Arabic, Spanish, Hindi, Sanskrit and Russian origins. It means date, date palm or palm tree and it is derived from biblical name Tamar (Hebrew: תמר tamar). In the Arabic from the singular form Tamra (Arabic: تَمْرَة tamrah) and the plural form Tamar (Arabic: تَمْر tamr). It was a common name in the 1970s in the English-speaking world. The variant, Tamar, is the second most popular name in Israel; it is also popular in Russia.

Etymology
Tamara means date, date palm or palm tree and it is derived from biblical name Tamar (Hebrew: תמר tamar) and in the Arabic from the singular form Tamra (Arabic: تَمْرَة tamrah) and the plural form Tamar (Arabic: تَمْر tamr). Tamara also has Spanish roots, meaning brushwood, and Sanskrit roots, meaning water. In Russian it means beauty and grace and it is typically associated with the queen Tamar of Georgia. In Hindi (Hindi: तामर tāmara) the name Tamara means spice.

In the Bible, the name Tamar is associated with two female characters: one, the daughter-in-law of Judah, Tamar, and the other, the daughter of King David and full sister of Absalom, Tamar. The latter Tamar was raped by her half-brother Amnon, leading Absalom to later kill him. Absalom also named his daughter Tamar, who is described as a woman of great beauty, possibly contributing to the name's popularity.

Variations of the name Tamara include Tamera, Tamra, and Tammara in English, while biblical equivalents are Tamar, Thamar, and Themar. Tamara can also be shortened to diminutives such as Tami, Tammi, Tammie, and Tammy in English, and Toma in Russian.

Popularity
It began to be used in the English-speaking world in the 1930s and it peaked in the 1970s. In the 1980s it was specially used by Black Americans. In the United States, the name was fairly common from the late 1950s to mid 1990s, bolstered by the popularity of the film Tammy and the Bachelor and its theme song. In the US the most girls named Tamara were born in 1970s and the number of Tamaras born per year was greater than 1,000 as late as 1996. The name, as of 2023, is fairly uncommon in the US: in 2010, the name fell off the Top 1000 Social Security Administration baby names list, with fewer than 250 baby girls named Tamara that year. Tamar(a) was once the most popular name for girls in Israel, in 2022 it dropped to second. Tamara is top 320 of most popular names in Australia since 1930s. being specially popular during the 1970s until the 1990s. In Spain it was a popular a name in the 1980s, this might have been because of Isabel Preysler and Carlos Falcó's child named Tamara Falcó. It is a popular name in Russia and it occurs with frequency in Russian literature. It is also a common name in Central and Eastern European countries.

Notable people with the given name

 * Tamara Adrián, Venezuelan politician
 * Tamara Al-Gabbani, Middle Eastern fashion designer
 * Tamara Arciuch, Polish actress
 * Tamara Bleszynski, Indonesian actress, singer, and model
 * Tamara Braun, American soap opera actress
 * Tamara Buciuceanu, Romanian actress
 * Tamara Bunke, better known as Tania the Guerrilla, a communist revolutionary
 * Tamara Danz, German rock singer
 * Tamāra Dauniene, Latvian basketball player
 * Tamara Degtyaryova, Russian stage, television and film actress
 * Tamara Dobson, African-American actress and model
 * Tamara Drasin, Ukrainian-born singer-actress
 * Tamara Duisenova, Kazakh politician
 * Tamara Ecclestone, English-Serbian socialite, television personality and model
 * Tamara Feldman, American actress
 * Tamara Finkelstein, British civil servant
 * Tamara Frolova, Russian politician
 * Tamara Georgijev, Serbian handball player
 * Tamara Gorski, Canadian actress
 * Tamara Gverdtsiteli, Georgian-Russian singer, actress and composer
 * Kera Tamara, known as Tamara Hejtan, Bulgarian princess
 * Tamara Jaber, Lebanese-Australian singer and songwriter
 * Tamara Johnson, American indoor volleyball player
 * Tamara Jones, singer and actress
 * Tamara Karsavina, Russian ballerina
 * Tamara Maria Kler, Swiss DJ known by her stage name Dinka
 * Tamara Larrea, Cuban beach volleyball player
 * Tamara de Lempicka, Polish art deco painter
 * Tamara Levitt, Canadian author, mindfulness instructor, and voice-over artist
 * Tamara Makarova, Russian-Soviet actress
 * Tamara Manukova, Belarusian politician
 * Tamara Marthe, known as Shy'm, French singer
 * Tamara McKinney, American skier
 * Tamara Mello, American actress
 * Tamara Mellon, president and founder of designer shoes company Jimmy Choo
 * Tammy Faye Messner, American televangelist and reality TV star
 * Tamara Metal, Israeli Olympic high jumper and long jumper, and captain of the Israel women's national basketball team
 * Tamara Mkheidze, Georgian arachnologist
 * Tamara Morávková, Slovak footballer
 * Tamara Moskvina, Russian pairs figure skating coach
 * Tamara Moss, Indian model
 * Tamara Gräfin von Nayhauß, German television presenter
 * Tamara Nowitzki (born 1976), Paralympic swimming competitor from Australia
 * Tamara Pamyatnykh, Soviet fighter pilot during the Second World War
 * Tamara Radočaj (born 1987), Serbian basketball player
 * Tamara Rojo (born 1974), Spanish ballet dancer, artistic director of English National Ballet
 * Tamara Salman, Iraqi-born designer
 * Tamara Samsonova, Russian murderer and suspected serial killer
 * Tamara Macarena Valcárcel Serrano, Spanish singer known as Tamara
 * Tamara Sher, American psychologist
 * Tamara Sinyavskaya, Russian mezzo-soprano
 * Tamara Sivakova, Paralympian athlete from Belarus
 * Tamara Sky, DJ and model
 * Tamara Smart, English actress
 * Tamara Stohlová, Slovak politician
 * Tamara Sujú, Venezuelan activist
 * Tamara Taylor, Canadian actress
 * Tamara Todevska, Macedonian pop singer
 * Tamara Toumanova, Georgian-Armenian ballerina and actress
 * Tamara Tunie, American actress
 * Tamara Diane Wimer, known as Isis Gee, American singer
 * Tamara Witmer, American actress and model
 * Tamara Zidanšek, Slovenian tennis player

Fictional characters with the given name

 * Tamara, in the British soap opera Hollyoaks
 * Princess Tamara, in the 1829/1839 poem Demon by Mikhail Lermontov
 * Tamara, in Princess Gwenevere and the Jewel Riders
 * Tamara Chen, in Scott Pilgrim
 * Tamara Jacobs, in Dawson's Creek
 * Tamara Riley, the main protagonist in Tamara
 * Tamara, the Queen of Goths, in William Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus