Word.ws English Dictionary

Shelley

/ˈʃɛli/

Shelley proper noun: percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822), a Romantic poet.

Proper noun

Shelley

  1. Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822), a Romantic poet.
  2. A habitational surname from Old English.
  3. A male given name transferred from the surname, of mostly before 1930 usage.
  4. (rare) A diminutive of the male given name Sheldon.
    • Shelley Berman
  5. A female given name transferred from the surname, of 1930s and later usage, also explained as a variant of Shirley or Michelle.
    • Senator Shelley Moore Capito, Republican of West Virginia, was juggling visits across her state and preparations to tee up a potential infrastructure deal when she learned that the top Senate Republican had described himself as “100 percent focused” on stopping President Biden’s agenda.2021 May 12, Emily Cochrane, “In Infrastructure Talks With Biden, Capito Faces Fraught Path to Deal”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 12 Aug 2021
  6. A diminutive of the female given name Rochelle.
    • Shelley Berkley
  7. A village in Ongar parish, Epping Forest district, Essex, England (OS grid ref TL5404).
  8. A small village and civil parish in Babergh district, Suffolk, England (OS grid ref TM0338).
  9. A village in Kirkburton parish, Kirklees borough, West Yorkshire, England (OS grid ref SE2011).
  10. A city in Bingham County, Idaho, United States.
  11. A community north-east of Prince George, British Columbia, Canada.
  12. A locality and former town in the Shire of Towong, north-east Victoria, Australia.
  13. A suburb of Perth in the City of Canning, Western Australia.

Forms of Shelley

alternative formShelly

Origin of Shelley

From Old English, meaning "clearing on a bank".

Words formed from Shelley

Words that rhyme with Shelley

15 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about Shelley

What does Shelley mean?
Shelley means percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822), a Romantic poet.
What part of speech is Shelley?
Shelley is a proper noun.
How do you pronounce Shelley?
Shelley is pronounced /ˈʃɛli/.

Words near Shelley in the dictionary

  1. Shellenberger
  2. Shellenbergers
  3. Shelleng
  4. sheller
  5. shellers
  6. Shelley
  7. Shelley Woodhouse
  8. Shelleyan
  9. Shelleyana
  10. Shelleyesque
  11. shellfire

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Shelley (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-Shelley.wav.

Cite this entry: “Shelley.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/shelley. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.