Sumaya — Name Meaning in Islam

Root: س-م-و (s-m-w), "to be high, to rise". Sumayya is a diminutive of Samāʾ or of Sāmiya: little high one, with the affection an Arabic diminutive carries rather than any sense of smallness in rank.

From the same root: samāʾ (sky, that which is above), ismعism (a name — what raises a thing above being nameless), sāmī (elevated), asmāʾ (names, and the name Asma), tasmiya (naming).

Who carried it: Sumayya bint Khayyat, among the earliest to accept Islam in Makkah and, in what the sources record, the first to be killed for it. She was not of a family that could protect her, which is the plain reason she and her household bore what they bore while others were shielded.

Why the name is given. It is given as an act of remembering. The name is not common as an ordinary choice; it carries a specific person, and parents who choose it are usually choosing her.

Spellings: Sumaya, Sumayya, Sümeyye (Turkish), Sumayyah (Indonesian), Sumaiya (Urdu), سمية.

Pronunciation: su-MAY-ya, with a doubled y.

Related from the same root: Asma, Samia, Sami, Samya.

Note: the diminutive form in Arabic names is common and affectionate — Ubayd from Abd, Husayn from Hasan, Sumayya from Samiya — and does not diminish the bearer.