We have no specific dates for Cora's life. The birth date shown here is that of her husband Rudolph Bolger, to which Cora's own date of birth was presumably comparable.

Though kóra literally meant a young girl or a daughter, it was often used poetically of divine beings, and especially for Persephone (originally called Kóre) the daughter of Demeter. Of course, the Greek pantheon would have been unknown to the Shire-hobbits, and so Cora Goodbody cannot have received her name directly through this route. Tolkien does not explain the logic behind the name; it may be that Cora was literally her name in the Shire, and had some unknown meaning in that context. Alternatively, Cora might be a translation of a similar concept in the mythology of Middle-earth (she might perhaps have originally been named Vána, after the Vala of that name, whose persona as the 'Ever-young' fits to some extent with the Greek meaning of the name).