Queen is the English word used as a given name; it goes back to the Old English cwen, which meant simply "woman" or "wife" before it came to mean the "female ruler". As a first name it has a long history in African American families, where it sits beside names like Princess and King. In the United States Queen entered the top 1000 for the first time in 2018 and peaked at number 945 that year; it has since dropped back to number 2234 in 2025.