Antonio

Antonio goes back to Antonius, the name of an old Roman clan, the gens Antonia. Where that clan name came from, nobody can say for certain. Its roots may be Etruscan, and the Romans themselves already read it without a settled meaning.

The gloss "priceless, invaluable" arrived much later. Medieval scholars tied the name to Latin and Greek words for worth, and the reading of Antonio as something beyond price took hold. It was a pious fiction that outlasted the men who coined it.

Carried by Saint Anthony of Padua, whose feast falls on June 13th, the name became a fixture across Italy and Spain. In Poland it settles into Antoni, and for a daughter it turns into Antonina. Open a Polish class register today and an Antoś sits near the top of the list.

So the meaning is a story told after the fact. Antonio still means priceless.