Kezia - what's the meaning of this name?

[jeddah]

Hi Susan,
Orange??? What next I ask myself!!! Apricot. Melon ,Lemon. Bet someone will say they have come across these names!!
All the best to everyone. Jeddah.

[daleaway]

In Britain it is traditionally pronounced to rhyme with Isaiah but an alternative pronunciation seems to have crept in, presumably from across the Atlantic, with the stress on the first syllable.

It may have been the other way round. If the name was originally meant to denote the cassia tree, as others have noted,we still pronounce that with the accent on the first syllable. Which would make KEYESia the original form.

I think it is probably analogous to the name Maria, which is Ma REE a in most Romance languages, but became Mar EYE a in 18th (at a guess) century England. I had a great grandmother born in the 1850s in Birmingham called Maria and I always sounded it out Ma REE a until my father corrected me - he had known the person concerned and said she called it Mar EYE a. Similarly on the other side of the family, Emma Mar EYE a was the name of a family member born in Bournemouth in Victorian times.
Putting EYEa on female names seems to have been a fashion trick of Victorian England.

About Orange as a name: it is of course a surname.
https://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Orange
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orange_(name)

(A foremost New Zealand historian is Dame Claudia Orange.)

[Susan Kitchen]

I didn't know it was a surname. I know that in my husbands family tree there are people who had a christian name that was the surname of the mother's maiden name, i.e Havelock Lattimer son of Sarah Lattimer nee Havelock. However i haven't come across anyone in the tree with the surname as Orange and that's going back to the 1500's. There are only these two girls with Orange as a christian name. Still something may crop up.

[Peter Goodey]

It may have been the other way round. If the name was originally meant to denote the cassia tree

But that isn't the way the name entered the English language. The name came from the Bible. Knowledge of the original etymology came later.

[Wilkes_ml]

It's funny how names come and go, but Keziah isn't a name you come across in living people - OK, someone will contradict me now!

lol...I named my first dog Kezia as I had the name in my family, and loved it. Then my son's father ran off with another woman and married her 3 months later - her name was Kezia - so yes there are still some living!

edied - just realised the date of the original post

[Peter Goodey]

FreeBMD lists 33 births of a Keziah after 1940 (and FreeBMD is not complete after the mid 1970s).

[Susan Kitchen]

lol...I named my first dog Kezia as I had the name in my family, and loved it. Then my son's father ran off with another woman and married her 3 months later - her name was Kezia - so yes there are still some living!

edied - just realised the date of the original post

There is an actress called Kezia? she used to be in Heartbeat i think some years ago. There is also a Scottish M.P called Kezia.
Yes it was some time ago i posted the original post. But it's nice that it's come to my attention again. I'm really interested and grateful to all who have put their thoughts etc. Thanks to all.

[Peter Goodey]

FreeBMD lists 33 births of a Keziah after 1940

I should have said 86 births of Kezia or Keziah. How vitally important!