Variant spelling of Anna/Hannah, from Hebrew meaning 'grace' or 'favor.'
Annah is a graceful variant of Hannah, one of the most enduring names in the Hebrew tradition. The root is "channah," meaning "grace," "favor," or more fully "favor shown by God." In the Hebrew Bible, Hannah is a woman of profound faith whose fervent, tear-stained prayer for a child is answered with the birth of Samuel, one of the greatest prophets of ancient Israel.
Her story — of longing, devotion, and fulfillment — has made the name a symbol of hope and answered prayer across Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions for millennia. Hannah spread through Europe with Christianity and became one of the standard names of the early modern period. It was particularly beloved among Puritan settlers in New England, who favored its Biblical gravity.
Hannah Arendt, the political philosopher; Hannah More, the eighteenth-century writer and reformer; and Hannah Senesh, the Hungarian-Jewish poet and wartime martyr, all gave the name an association with intellectual and moral courage that deepens its resonance. The spelling Annah — with its doubled final consonant — gives the name a softer, more lyrical visual quality, suggesting a family that wanted the name's warm meaning while putting a personal signature on it. It reads almost like a whispered repetition of the name's final syllable, a small echo. In a landscape crowded with Annas and Hannahs, Annah distinguishes itself without straying far from the beloved original.