A female name. Greek Φύλλις ‘green leaf’, the name of a girl who hanged herself for love and was turned into a tree. Phyllis was used as a name in Greek and Roman pastoral poetry, and was adopted in England in the 16th C, when it became confused with Felis, the usual English form of Felicia (q.v.), so that it is often difficult to decide which name is meant. For instance, in a list of Yorkshire recusants of 1604 there are a number of cases of Phillis, Philles, Phillice, which almost certainly represent Felice, Felis rather than Phyllis. The 17th-C poets also used the form Phillida and a Fillida was married at Leigh, Lancashire, in 1620. Phyllis became almost obsolete in the 18th and 19th C, but suddenly came back into favour at the end of the 19th C, and is now common.

An old female baptismal name, derived from the Greek Phyllis, name of a countrywoman introduced in Virgil’s Eclogues, and of a nurse of Lycurgus, King of Thrace, and of a nurse of the Emperor Domitian. From φυλλις for φυλας, a green branch covered with leaves, a leaf, foliage, a heap of leaves; in Herod. 8, 24, a bed of leaves. In one instance (mentioned in N. Q. 5th S. i. 357) the name Phillis has been corrupted from Felicia.

Greek (feminine) - A reed.

A Greek name, meaning: Form of Phyllis. Phillis also is re­garded by some authorities as a variant of Felicia, happy.