Giselle

About Giselle

Giselle is a French name with a Germanic root meaning “pledge” or “hostage.” Its modern associations are much more theatrical than that old meaning suggests: a landmark Romantic ballet and Disney’s Enchanted both place a character named Giselle at the center of the story.

Meaning, spelling, and pronunciation

The name comes from the Germanic element gisal. Giselle was familiar in medieval France, while Gisèle is another French spelling. Gisela and Gisella belong to the same wider family, used in other European languages.

In English, Giselle is usually jih-ZEL, with the emphasis on the second syllable. The French pronunciation begins with the soft sound heard in the middle of English “measure”: approximately zhee-ZELL. Both pronunciations have two syllables, and neither gives the final written “e” a separate sound.

Gisèle keeps a visible French accent, while Gisselle doubles the “s.” Gisa is an established short form in the German branch of the family.

The ballet Giselle

Adolphe Adam composed the music for Giselle, first produced in 1841. Its heroine is a village girl who falls in love with Albrecht, unaware that he is a nobleman engaged to someone else. Discovering his deception destroys her, and the story then moves from the human world into the supernatural.

Giselle’s spirit joins the Wilis, ghosts of women betrayed before marriage. They force men to dance to their deaths, but Giselle tries to protect Albrecht. The contrast between her living, village self and her ghostly second-act presence gives the title role its dramatic range.

The ballet has continued to invite careful reinterpretation. Mary Skeaping’s version was first produced for London Festival Ballet, now English National Ballet, in 1971. She had spent years researching the original 1841 work in order to recover its Romantic style. That continuing performance tradition has carried the name across generations of dancers and audiences.

Giselle in Enchanted

Disney’s Enchanted, released in 2007, gives the name a very different fairy-tale setting. Its Giselle begins in the animated land of Andalasia before being banished into live-action Manhattan.

The collision between her fairy-tale expectations and a modern city supplies much of the comedy. A divorce lawyer comes to her aid, bringing a practical view of relationships into contact with her much more idealized one. The character links Giselle with a bright musical fantasy as well as with the older ballet.

Popularity in the United States

Giselle’s strongest American year was 2007, when it ranked No. 134 with 2,596 girls. That was also the year Enchanted appeared.

In 2025, it ranked No. 382 with 803 girls. The name remains familiar, but its use has settled well below its mid-2000s peak.

How popular is Giselle?

In 2025, Giselle ranked #382 among girls in the United States, with 803 recorded uses. The U.S. birth records first list this spelling for girls in 1949; its largest annual count was 2,596 in 2007. Rankings count each spelling separately. They describe national use, so local familiarity can differ. The popularity chart shows whether the name has remained common, returned after a quieter period, or risen recently.