Meaning & Origin
A female given name from Persian; a spelling variant of Roxane, fairly popular since the 1930s.
Roxanne is a girl's and boy's baby name of Persian origin, the Greek form of the Old Persian name Roshanak, from rōšn (bright, luminous), meaning 'dawn, bright, radiant.' She was the Bactrian princess who became Alexander the Great's wife.
Roxanne's Persian luminosity has shone through centuries of Western culture — from the historical queen of Alexander's empire to Cyrano de Bergerac's beloved to The Police's iconic 1978 song "Roxanne." Few names carry such a combination of ancient royal history and pop-song immortality.