Meaning and background
The story behind Leila
Leila is one of several spellings of the Arabic-derived Layla, associated with the word for night. It passed through Persian and other languages, and Byron used Leila in his nineteenth-century poetry. English pronunciations vary between LAY-luh, LEE-luh and LYE-luh, so a single imposed pronunciation would be misleading. The night meaning belongs to the established name family, rather than to every sound-alike spelling in unrelated languages.
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About Leila
Recorded as a dog’s name
Leila appears in 33 dog licence records in the 2026 New York City dataset.
How to read this count
These records cover New York City and may count the same dog in more than one licence period. They are not a national popularity ranking.
Pronunciation and rhythm
/lilə/
US English sound sequence, converted from the CMU dictionary. Stress marks are shown separately.
Stress on the first syllable in the recorded US readings.
View dictionary notation
/lilə/ · primary stress on syllable 1L IY1 L AH0
These are US dictionary readings. Personal, regional and other language pronunciations may differ.
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Sources and research notes (2)
Gender association: NYC licence-period records. Any dog can use this name.
- New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene NYC Dog Licensing Dataset — extract_year 2026 — Dog licence periods, not unique dogs; NYC only. No owner-level fields retrieved.
- Carnegie Mellon University / CMU Sphinx maintainers CMU US English Pronouncing Dictionary — US English dictionary readings; not owner-specific or exhaustive multilingual pronunciation
References support the individual facts shown. A source link does not mean the entire profile has been verified.