Priscilla is an English female given name adopted from the Roman Prisca, derived from the Latin priscus. One suggestion is that it is intended to bestow long life on the bearer.
It appears in the New Testament of the Christian Bible variously as Priscilla and Prisca, a female leader in the early Church. The name appears in English literature in Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene (1596) and was adopted as an English name by the Puritans in the 17th century. The use of the name began to decline during the 1960s, possibly because of an association with the slang term prissy, in the sense of meaning prim or prudish.
Diminutive forms of the name include Lily, Cilla, Pris, Prissy, Prisk, Pru/Prue and Scilla.
Priscilla may refer to:
Priscilla, an early Christian of the Christian New Testament and companion to St. Paul; see Priscilla and Aquila
Priscilla (Brazilian singer) (born 1990), Brazilian singer and songwriter
Priscilla Betti (born 1989), French singer and actress
Priscilla Ahn, singer
Priscilla Alden (c. 1602-c. c. 1680), member of Massachusetts's Plymouth Colony, wife of John Alden
Priscilla Barnes (born 1955), American actress
Priscilla Bertie, 21st Baroness Willoughby de Eresby (1761–1828)
Priscilla Chan (singer) (born 1965), singer from Hong Kong
Priscilla Chan (philanthropist) (born 1985), philanthropist and wife of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerburg
Priscilla Hill (born 1960), American retired figure skater
Priscilla Horton (1818–1895), English singer and actress
Priscilla Kemble (1756–1845), English actress
Priscilla Lane (1915–1995), of the singing Lane Sisters
Priscilla Leung (born 1961), Hong Kong legislator, barrister and associate professor
Priscilla Lopez (born 1948), American singer, dancer and actress
Priscilla Lopes-Schliep (born 1982), Canadian track and field hurdler
Priscilla Martel (born 1956), American chef, food writer and consultant
Priscilla Nzimiro (born 1923), physician from Nigeria
Priscilla Owen (born 1954), United States federal judge for the Fifth Circuit
Priscilla Pointer (born 1924), American actress and mother of actress Amy Irving
Priscilla Presley (born 1945), American actress and businesswoman and ex-wife of Elvis Presley
Priscilla Cooper Tyler (1816–1889), former acting First Lady of the United States, the daughter-in-law of President John Tyler
Priscilla J. Smith, American Lawyer and Activist
Priscilla Wakefield (1751–1832), English Quaker educational writer and philanthropist
Priscilla Welch (born 1944), British marathon runner
Prisca may refer to:
Prisca (empress) (d. 315), Roman empress, wife of Diocletian and mother of Valeria Galeria
Prisca (Prophet) (late 2nd century), Founding leader and prophet of Montanism
Saint Prisca (late 1st century), Roman Catholic martyr and saint
