indicate the level to which a name has been verified.
Gender Feminine
Usage History
Meaning & History
From the English word meaning "one who stays temporarily (sojourns)", which is ultimately derived from the Latin elements sub "under, until" and diurnus "of a day" (from diurnum "day"), via the vulgar Latin subdiurnare "to spend the day". The minister, abolitionist, woman's rights activist, speaker and ex-slave Sojourner Truth took the name in 1843, believing this to be the instructions of the Holy Spirit, and became a traveling preacher (the combined meaning of her new name).