Artem

Artem belongs to the Slavic world, a name worn by Ukrainians and Russians as an everyday first name. Its root reaches back to the Greek Artemios, tied to the goddess Artemis, and to the old Greek word artemḗs, meaning safe and sound. That is where the sense of the name comes from: healthy, unharmed, whole. The link to Artemis, protector of the young, was folded in early.

In Poland the name stays less common than Artur, though it turns up on a class register where a Ukrainian family has settled. The spelling stays simple. Five letters, easy for a Polish ear to say.

The Polish gloss keeps close to that old Greek word: zdrowy, nietknięty, bezpieczny. A boy named Artem wears a word that once meant safe and sound.