Submitted Name Revision History

The earliest known bearer of this name is the Egyptian saint Pitirim of Porphyry (4th century AD), who is primarily venerated in the Eastern Orthodox Church. The meaning and origin of his name are uncertain. It is not even clear whether Pitirim is the original form of his name; it may well be a later form that arose in medieval Russia, for the name has been most prevalent there.

Should that indeed happen to be the case, then it must be said that the form of the name is actually rather peculiar. You see, Russian names that originate from saints primarily come from Greek sources, as is typical of Eastern Orthodox Christianity. The standard Greek form of the name is Pityroun, which would normally have been rendered into Russian as Питирун (Pitirun), as the language usually remains quite faithful to the original Greek form of names. Not in this case, however.

Perhaps Pitirim is actually based on a different Greek form of the name, namely the variant Πιτυροῦμ (Pityroum). Another possibility is Πιτηροῦμ (Piteroum), since this name becomes Pitiroum in (early) modern Greek. But even with these variants, the Russian adaptation is not as faithful as it should have been: -ροῦμ (-roum) should have become -рум (-rum) instead of -рим (-rim), which is visually and phonetically quite different. However, it is worth noting that this type of deviation is not unique to these names: comparable examples include the noun Рим (Rim) meaning "Rome" and the adjective римский (rimskiy) meaning "Roman".

Another Greek variant of the name is Πιτυρίων (Pityrion). Some sources also mention Pithyrion, which must be an alternate transcription of the aforementioned name, since the corresponding Greek spelling Πιθυρίων does not appear to have been recorded in historical sources. With that said, Pityrion is too different to have been the basis for Pitirim; it would almost certainly have become Питирион (Pitirion) in Russian, as Greek -ίων (-ion) has always been preserved in Russian as -ион (-ion). There have been no exceptions to this rule, at least to my knowledge.

Instead, Pityrion is notable for a different reason: it is very reminiscent of the obscure Greek name Πιτύρων (Pityron), which is most likely derived from Greek πίτυρον (pityron) meaning "husks of corn, bran". In turn, the word is ultimately derived from Greek πίτυρα (pityra) meaning "bran". Due to this close resemblance, some people have come to associate Pityrion (and by extension Pitirim) with that origin and meaning. However, the name is not necessarily of Greek origin: it can easily be a hellenization of a Coptic name, since saint Pitirim was born and raised in Egypt. The previously mentioned Greek forms of Piteroum, Pityroum and Pityroun certainly do point in that direction, as no plausible Greek etymology exists for them.

However, even a Coptic origin is not necessarily guaranteed, as Egyptian society was not homogeneous at the time. As a result, it is possible that Pitirim (and by extension its hellenizations) is actually of Nubian or even Semitic origin. For example, compare the ancient Hebrew word פיתרונ (pytrwn) or פיתרוו (pitaron) meaning "interpretation (of dreams)".

All in all, it is very difficult to determine the linguistic origin of this name - at least at this point in time. Perhaps in the future it will be possible to do so, especially once it becomes clear how the saint's name is written in the Coptic language. After all, he should also be venerated in the Coptic Orthodox Church, which means that the Copts must have their own name for him.

Lastly, notable Russian bearers of this name include the Russian-American sociologist Pitirim Sorokin (1889-1968) and Pitirim of Krutitskiy († 1673), the 9th Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia.