Demetrius

Historical scholarship

Passages quoted verbatim from public-domain reference works. They reflect the scholarship of their time, not current consensus, and may use obsolete spellings.

• 1884From the archives

  Demetrius— “of Demeter”

  Formerly Demeter had numerous votaries, especially among the Macedonians, who were the greatest name-spreaders among the Greeks, and used it in all the “four horns” of their divided empire. It occurs in the Acts, as the silversmith of Ephesus, who stirred up the tumult against St. Paul, and another Demetrius is commended by St. John. The Latin Church has no saint so called; but the Greek had a Cretan monk of the fourteenth century, who was a great ecclesiastical author; and a…

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  Formerly Demeter had numerous votaries, especially among the Macedonians, who were the greatest name-spreaders among the Greeks, and used it in all the “four horns” of their divided empire. It occurs in the Acts, as the silversmith of Ephesus, who stirred up the tumult against St. Paul, and another Demetrius is commended by St. John. The Latin Church has no saint so called; but the Greek had a Cretan monk of the fourteenth century, who was a great ecclesiastical author; and a Demetrios, who is reckoned as the second great saint of Thessalonika. Hence Demetrios is one of the most popular of names in all the Eastern Church, and the countries that have ever been influenced by it; among whom must be reckoned the Venetian dominions which considered themselves to belong to the old Byzantine empire till they were able to stand alone. Dimitri has always been a great name in Russia. The Slavonian nations give it the contraction Mitar, and the feminine Dimitra or Mitra. The modern Greek contraction is Demos.

  Yonge, History of Christian Names (1884), Part III, Chapter II (Names From Greek Mythology), Section VII (Demeter) · Public domain (Project Gutenberg)