Itan

Itan comes from Hebrew, where the word means strong, firm, enduring. The older form appears in the Hebrew Bible as Ethan, the name of Ethan the Ezrahite, a man remembered for wisdom and named in the heading of Psalm 89. The same root can describe a river that never runs dry and ground that holds firm under weight. The meaning sits inside the word itself.

Short and blunt. Itan has two syllables and no soft edges. Polish speakers read it easily, since the spelling asks nothing unusual from the tongue.

On a Polish class register, Itan stands out among the Jakubs and Antonis, and that difference is part of what the name offers. The Polish sense, silny and trwały, stays close to the Hebrew idea of something that lasts. A child called Itan carries a word that first described strength in stone and water.