Oktawian

Oktawian traces back to the Latin Octavianus, built on octavus, meaning "eighth." In Polish that sense stays plain as ósmy. Roman families sometimes numbered their children by order of birth, so a son who arrived eighth could carry the count in his own name.

The most famous holder wore it only for a while. Gaius Octavius, grand-nephew and adopted heir of Julius Caesar, was called Octavian before the Senate granted him the title Augustus in 27 BC. So the name sits at a hinge of Roman history, borne by a young man on his way to becoming an emperor. It reached Poland much later, in the nineteenth century.

The feminine variant is Oktawia, from the same root and the same meaning.

Picture a school register in September. A teacher reads down the list and stops at Oktawian, three syllables among the Jans and Piotrs. The name-day falls on the sixth of August, kept for Blessed Oktawian of Savona, a Benedictine bishop. The count inside the name never changes: eighth, ósmy, octavus.