La
loc · Latin script
Meaning, in English: Initialism of left atrium
Recorded for both men and women· direction only, no split published
La is a name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Algeria than in any other country, where it is the 15th most common surname.
- DZAlgeria≈1 in 385(inferred from the name graph)
- TNTunisia≈1 in 2.9K
- MAMorocco≈1 in 3.7K
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). Where a country counts another spelling of the name rather than La itself, the figure is that spelling’s, and it is named. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- Algeria (inferred from the name graph)
- 2 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 497 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 385 (inferred from the name graph)
≈110,000 people, est.
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
Algeria, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
Locally spelled Lä in EC Ecuador.
Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records, and ○ marks a model's transliteration; click a spelling to open its page.
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
feminine singular definite article; the
Sources 1
- kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Attested across 17 languages in the etymology graph.
How La is read(measured from records)
La is one spelling over 2 language communities, and the dictionaries record it differently in 2 of them. Each row is what a source recorded for that language, beside the share of this name’s records the language holds. No single row is the name’s meaning.
- English29%
Initialism of left atrium.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
- Spanish12%
feminine singular definite article; the
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
The share is ours — how much of this name’s records each language holds. The sense beside it is the source’s, quoted and credited, including where it names a gender. We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.
Where in the world(measured from records)
La counted together with the spellings and other-language forms grouped with it. Where a register counted another spelling, the row names it.
Sorted by bearers: national registers' counts, and Mondonomo's estimates (≈, est.) where no register counts.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DZ Algeria | #15 | ≈110,000 est. | ≈1 in 385 | — | La | 19 |
| CN China | — | ≈52,000 est. | ≈1 in 27K | — | La | 47 |
| DE Germany | — | ≈17,000 est. | ≈1 in 4.9K | — | La | 148 |
| BR Brazil | — | 11,408 | 1 in 19K | 11K | La | 109 |
| MA Morocco | — | ≈9,600 est. | ≈1 in 3.7K | — | La | 30 |
| EC Ecuador | — | 4,741as Laz | 1 in 3.6K | 4.7K | Lä | 76 |
| NL Netherlands | — | ≈4,500 est. | ≈1 in 3.9K | 29 | La | 94 |
| TN Tunisia | #858 | ≈4,100 est. | ≈1 in 2.9K | — | La | 16 |
Exact figures are national registers' own counts, while figures marked ≈ and est. are Mondonomo’s estimates, counted from our sources and calibrated against those registers; hover one for how far to trust it in that country. A dash means neither exists.
Registers cited: IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname); INEC — civil registry names; Meertens NVB — Nederlandse Voornamenbank (live per-name BRP counts, 1790-2017). Figures without a register are Mondonomo estimates; see Methodology.
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).
Other recorded senses(measured from records)
La is also recorded in 4 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
two Vietnamese names, both unexplained.
as a nameDictionary of American Family Names
In dag, pron 1. that; referring to a word already mentioned or a word understood 2. this word may be used to qualify and co-ordinate a subordinate clause when that clause refers to past time. KO def. article for ‘new’ information
as a wordDagbani Dictionary CD
In dag, last- [following time expression] AJN entry : ? = la : dalila ‘day before yesterday’; sohala ‘yesterday’; Atani la dali ‘last Monday’
as a wordDagbani Dictionary CD
In cdo, to seize, to mix with ‘the finger, to feel of, as a fowl’s crop, (mud)
as a wordDictionary of the Foochow Dialect
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- Luo Guanzhongb. 1334CNnot in their usual name14th-century Chinese writer
- Na Hye-sokb. 1896KRnot in their usual namewriter and painter from Korea (1896-1948)
- Na Woon-gyub. 1902KPnot in their usual nameKorean actor and director (1902–1937)
- Luo Ruiqingb. 1906CNnot in their usual nameChinese general, politician (1906-1978)
- Lo Weib. 1918CNnot in their usual nameChinese film director (1918–1996)
- Na Moon-heeb. 1941KRnot in their usual nameSouth Korean actress
- Na Young-heeb. 1961KRnot in their usual nameSouth Korean actress
- Ra Mi-ranb. 1975KRnot in their usual nameSouth Korean actress
- Show Lob. 1979TWnot in their usual nameTaiwanese singer, actor and dancer
- Na Hae-ryungb. 1994KRnot in their usual nameSouth Korean singer and actress
The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 67 sources across 39 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname) | — | 11K | #1,202 |
Reference works 5
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikipedia surname tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- Where does the name La come from?
- feminine singular definite article; the Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).
- What does the name La mean?
- In English, Initialism of left atrium.
- In which country does La have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 111 thousand people named La in Algeria, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled la.
- How common is the name La?
- In Brazil, the national register counted 11,408 people named La, about 1 in 19 thousand residents.
- How common is La compared with other names?
- In Algeria, La is the 15th most common surname of 89,473 surnames recorded there.
What do you want to know about La?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/laThe payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. It takes a free API key (1,000 requests a day), which returns what this page shows everyone; the full country table, every register citation and the year-by-year series come with a licensed key, as does bulk access.
About this data
measured from records inferred from the name graph machine-generated
These figures come from the data snapshot of and will change as it is rebuilt.
Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.
Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.
Cite this page Mondonomo, “La” — the 15th most common surname in Algeria. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.