Selva
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Meaning
forest in Spanish
How popular is Selva around the world?
In the United States, Selva is not on the Social Security record for 2020 to 2025: names under 5 in a year are withheld at source. In Chile, 2 girls were registered as Selva in 2021, every accent spelling counted together.
Selva is on the official records of Chile, Argentina and Spain.
United States
under 5 a year
In the United States, Selva is not on the Social Security record for 2020 to 2025: names under 5 in a year are withheld at source.
Shape drawn from US Social Security baby-name records. Selva has stayed rare in US records the whole time: no peak decade to name.
Births with a Social Security record. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration
Chile
1 in 89,000
In Chile, 2 girls were registered as Selva in 2021, every accent spelling counted together.
share of that year’s name registrations
First-name registrations with Chile’s civil registry by year of registration, 1920–2021, counted as spelling groups (Sofía, Sofia and Sofìa are one name, shown with its most-registered spelling); the registry withholds nothing, nametree keeps the groups that reached 5 registrations in some year, and shares divide by every registration of the year. Source: Servicio de Registro Civil e Identificación (Chile) via the guaguas package, first-name registrations 1920-2021
Argentina
1 in 110,000
In Argentina, 6 newborns were given the name Selva in 2024.
share of that year’s name registrations
Given-name components of births in Argentina 2012–2024; national cells are lower bounds and no sex split is published. Source: RENAPER (Argentina), Dirección Nacional de Población, given names 2012-2024
Spain
1 in 120,000
In Spain, 367 residents are named Selva, ranked 2,835th among women, with a mean age of 21.1 years.
Residents of Spain on 1 January 2025. Spain publishes how old a name’s living bearers are, not a birth series, so there is no year chart. Source: INE (Spain), Censo de Población anual, 1 January 2025
Austria
last on record 2023
Selva is not on the 2025 record for Austria, which publishes every first name down to a single birth, so the name was not given there that year.
The count never rose above 1 in a year, too few to chart.
Live births in Austria by year of birth, 1984–2025, from Statistik Austria’s first-name statistics; spellings that differ only by special characters are counted together (umlauts stay apart), every name down to a single birth is published, and the count covers babies with Austrian citizenship only until 2009, every baby from 2010, and from 2015 also births abroad to mothers living in Austria. Shares divide by Statistik Austria’s count of live births from 2010, and before that by the file’s own total for the year. Source: Statistik Austria - data.statistik.gv.at (OGDEXT_VORNAMEN_1, updated 2026-07-09)
Montevideo City
last on record 2009
Selva is not on the 2011 record for Montevideo, whose registry withholds nothing, so the spelling was not given there that year.
share of that year’s births on record
Births in the department of Montevideo (not all of Uruguay) by first name and year of birth, 1940–2011, from the city’s civil registry, which writes names in capitals, almost always without accents; counted as spelling groups (accent and punctuation variants merged), nothing is withheld at source, and 2012 is excluded as a partial year. Source: Servicio de Registro Civil, Intendencia de Montevideo, Partidas de Registro Civil de Montevideo (Licencia de Datos Abiertos - Uruguay); 2012 dropped as partial
Not on the record in Mexico City, Puerto Rico, England and Wales, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, Scotland and Poland: those registries withhold small counts, so rare uses may sit below their floors.
Not on the France record: nametree keeps spellings that reached 20 births in some year, so rarer uses are not shown. Not on the South Australia record for 1944 to 2017: that registry withholds nothing, so this spelling was not given there in those years. Not on Norway’s list: Statistics Norway lists only first names carried by 200 or more living people, so rarer names are not shown.
The Selva deep dive
Whether you’re naming a baby or exploring your own name’s history, this is a personal letter, not a list: where Selva truly comes from, how it traveled, and what a century of records reveals. If you have grown a tree on nametree, it also considers how Selva fits with your family’s names and surname.
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