Viacheslav

Viacheslav grows from Slavic soil, from a first element meaning "greater" or "more" joined to slava, glory. The whole reads as great glory, wielka sława in Polish. The name settled mostly with Russian and Ukrainian families, though its two building blocks travelled the whole Slavic map.

Its closest western cousins are the Czech Václav and the Polish Wacław, made from the same pair of words. One Václav became Saint Wenceslas, the tenth-century duke of Bohemia later sung about in an English Christmas carol. So a Kyiv Viacheslav and a Prague Václav are, in a sense, one name in two mouths.

The record holds real bearers. Vyacheslav Ivanov, the Russian Symbolist poet, signed his verse with it around 1900. This form keeps no diminutive of its own; it stands at full length. Say it slow. On a Polish class register a Ukrainian Viacheslav fills the line and keeps its plain meaning, great glory.