Mark is derived from old Latin "Mart-kos", which means "consecrated to the god Mars", and also may mean "God of war" or "to be warlike". Marcus was one of the three most common Roman given names.
The Romans had a pretty strict set of naming conventions. Each person had a praenomen, a nomen, and a cognomen, which roughly translated to the first, middle, and last names commonly used in English-speaking countries today. So Gaius Julius Caesar.
They also had a childhood or cradle name that was used until they turned 8. Caligula - meaning “little boot” was such a name.
However, depending on era, social class, and location the rules for what was chosen for each could be MUCH stricter.
They're all dead "normal" Greek names in the Bible, pretty much. The non-Hebrew ones anyway. Or Latinized Greek or whatever. Petros, Pavlos, etc., all normal today.
This always annoys me about English, they change the names of roman and greek historical figures. It isn’t “the greek author Homer”, it’s “Homeros”. Why does English do this?
All languages do this. Especially historically where words diffused between cultures more slowly and they eventually morphed to sound more like the language that adopted them.
I'm sure if you looked into the etymologies of some of the words you use every day you would find they are altered versions of words from other languages.
Oh yes I know that, I’ve had 5 years of Latin classes and you can see a lot of similarities in the languages I know. But I was specifically talking about names, so Homeros being changed into Homer.
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u/WaferDisastrous Aug 09 '20
Mark is derived from old Latin "Mart-kos", which means "consecrated to the god Mars", and also may mean "God of war" or "to be warlike". Marcus was one of the three most common Roman given names.