Anfisa
From the Greek for "flower". Around 184 Polish women carry it, few enough that most Poles have never met one.
Anfisa Pronunciation
Anfisa is pronounced ahn-FEE-sah (/anˈfisa/).
What Anfisa means
Where Anfisa comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Anfisa begins in Greek, in the word ánthos, which means flower. The older form is Anthousa (Ἀνθοῦσα), from the same root behind anthology and chrysanthemum. That flower sense is what Polish renders as kwitnąca.
The name reached Russian through the Orthodox calendar, where Byzantine saints named Anthusa were remembered. Saint Anthusa of Constantinople is one of them. On Russian tongues Anthousa settled into Anfisa, written Анфиса. Anton Chekhov gave the name to the old nurse in his 1901 play Three Sisters, an eighty-year-old woman named Anfisa.
In Poland the name is uncommon. A teacher reading a class register in Kraków would pause on it before the more familiar Anias and Zofias. What she would be reading, under the Slavic surface, is a Greek word for a thing in bloom: ánthos, flower, kwitnąca.
How many people are named Anfisa
1 in 122521 women in Poland is named Anfisa. 184 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #2337 among female names.
Anfisa's popularity over time
Fewer than 2 girls were given the name in 2025. It has been stable for a decade.