View Message

Walter Burkhart's Neues Lexikon der Vornamen lists Werna as a short form of any feminine name starting with Wern-, and includes Wernburg, Werngard, Wernhild, and Wernhilde as such names. Burkhart says that syllable is from a Germanic word meaning "to restrain, to defend", and it's probably basically the same word as the first syllable of Werner, explained as "guard" on this site.

---

Werna is not contained in my Dutch dictionary of given names, so I would suppose it is more of a German than a Dutch name. :)