Klemens
From the Latin for gentle or merciful. Around 1,500 Polish men carry it, so most people here have never met one, yet it's climbing: more boys got the name last year than in most years past.
Klemens Pronunciation
Klemens is pronounced KLE-mens (/ˈklɛmɛns/).
What Klemens means
Where Klemens comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Klemens comes from the Latin adjective clemens, meaning merciful and gentle. Romans used it as a cognomen, a family surname that praised a mild temper, and it passed into Christian use through the early bishops of Rome who bore it. The short meaning stays close to the root: łagodny, someone easy to forgive.
A boy named Klemens carries a word that once described emperors asked to show mercy. In Poland the name has a fixed spot on the calendar, its imieniny falling on the twenty-third of November. Read a class register from an older Polish school and you might find one Klemens among the Jans and Piotrs, a name never common yet never gone.
The feminine form is Klemensa, rarer still. Both keep the same promise of a gentle nature. The meaning in Polish is simply łagodny.
When Klemens celebrates name day
Klemens appears 8 times in the Polish name day calendar, 2 of them as a main name, the first on 15 March.
The days Polish calendars list this name on. By custom you celebrate one of them, usually the first after your birthday.
Rarer dates. Only the most complete calendars add this name on these days. Most skip them, so hardly anyone celebrates then.
How many people are named Klemens
1 in 14007 men in Poland is named Klemens. 1,524 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #793 among male names.
Klemens's popularity over time
39 boys were given the name in 2025, ranking #396 among newborns. It has been climbing since 2004.
Where parents choose Klemens
Klemens is most popular in Lesser Poland, 425% above the national average (107 boys born 2019–2025), followed by Silesian (+3%). It is least common in Łódź and Lower Silesian, 82% and 79% below average respectively.
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Lesser Poland
+425%1 in 2,121 babies
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Silesian
+3%1 in 10,837 babies
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Łódź
−82%1 in 63,359 babies
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Lower Silesian
−79%1 in 52,378 babies
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Subcarpathian
−63%1 in 30,141 babies
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Lesser Poland+425% 107 born1 in 2,121 babies+425%
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Silesian+3% 21 born1 in 10,837 babies+3%
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Pomeranian−2% 13 born1 in 11,332 babies−2%
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Masovian−31% 22 born1 in 16,103 babies−31%
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Greater Poland−48% 10 born1 in 21,524 babies−48%
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Opole−52% 2 born1 in 23,048 babies−52%
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Lubusz−55% 2 born1 in 24,829 babies−55%
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Lublin−57% 4 born1 in 25,669 babies−57%
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Kuyavian-Pomeranian−59% 4 born1 in 27,345 babies−59%
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Subcarpathian−63% 4 born1 in 30,141 babies−63%
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Lower Silesian−79% 3 born1 in 52,378 babies−79%
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Łódź−82% 2 born1 in 63,359 babies−82%
Klemens as a middle name
Klemens is a first name for 1,524 men in Poland and a middle name for another 2,885, a 35/65 split. In the men's middle-name ranking it sits 152nd, between Marceli (3,037) and Borys (2,838).
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#150 John3,086
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#151 Marceli3,037
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#152 Klemens2,885
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#153 Borys2,838
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#154 Tobiasz2,727