This name was invented by George Lucas and he didn't base it on the name Leah.This is what his biographer wrote:“Her name evokes the lovely Princess Dejah Thoris in the John Carter of Mars tales by Edgar Rice Burroughs, as well as Lady Galadriel of Lothlorien in J. R. R. Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings."He just played around with the sounds and arrived at Leia. In my opinion, Leia (the Biblical version) and Leia (popular culture) should have different entries here as they evolved in very different ways.
― Anonymous User 7/29/2020
2
Leia, Leja, Laeh, Lia are all the same name. The Leia is a change of the J used in the Polish which Americans would never understand. My grandmother named Leja came from Poland. I am Laeh, same name but American. In German the name is Lea. All these names refer to the wife of Jacob in the Bible in the way Hebrew is pronounced.I am a genealogist who speaks 5 languages and has worked for more than 25 years in Europe going from one country to another. Over this time I've tracked names extensively.
Oddly enough, the Greek word for 'princess' is 'vasileia'. I think Lucas might have taken the name "Leia" as a contraction of the word, as well as making it a variant spelling of "Leah".
This is what his biographer wrote:
“Her name evokes the lovely Princess Dejah Thoris in the John Carter of Mars tales by Edgar Rice Burroughs, as well as Lady Galadriel of Lothlorien in J. R. R. Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings."
He just played around with the sounds and arrived at Leia. In my opinion, Leia (the Biblical version) and Leia (popular culture) should have different entries here as they evolved in very different ways.