English. Cecil [q.v.] is traditionally a male name but there are many examples of its use for girls. The reasoning is not clear, there being several more usual female names (see above for the main ones). There are several possible reasons for its feminine use:
Some families have long used the name regularly through the generations and clearly saw no reason to exclude girls from the tradition.
It is an well established surname and has been transferred to use as a given name.
The 'normal' girl's names, Cecily, Cecilia and to a lesser extent Cicely may have been shortened in the nursery to Cecil as a pet name, giving rise to its use as a given name.
The variant Ciclia has been recorded in the 1742 parish register of Monimail in The Kingdom of Fife [TL3]. |
