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Japanese No. The name Cynthia does not appear in the Bible. It comes from the Greek Kynthia, “woman from Cynthus,” a title of the goddess Artemis, who in Greek myth was born on Mount Cynthus on the island of Delos. Artemis herself does appear in the Bible: Acts 19 describes a riot in her name at Ephesus.
Is Cynthia a biblical name?
Cynthia is not found in the Hebrew or Greek text of the Bible or in any translation, and neither are its forms in other languages: Cintia in Spanish, Cíntia in Portuguese, Cinzia in Italian. The name is Greek, so it has no Hebrew form and no Hebrew meaning. As a name for girls it is also much later than the Bible, since it was not used as a given name until the Renaissance.
What does Cynthia mean?
Cynthia is the Latin form of Kynthia, which means “woman from Cynthus.” Cynthus is the mountain on Delos where, in Greek mythology, Artemis and her twin brother Apollo were born, and Kynthia was one of her titles. Artemis was the daughter of Zeus and Leto and the goddess of hunting, wild animals and the wilderness; she was also worshiped as a goddess of the moon, and the Romans identified her with their goddess Diana. In Latin, Cynthia became a name for Diana and, in poetry, for the moon itself, and the Roman poet Propertius addressed his love elegies to a woman he called Cynthia. The name is often explained as “moon goddess,” but its literal meaning is the place name.
One early use in English is Richard Barnfield’s poem Cynthia (1595), written in praise of Queen Elizabeth I. The name did not become common in the English-speaking world until the 19th century. In the United States it was among the ten most popular names for girls from 1956 to 1965 and reached seventh place in 1957; it has declined steadily since, ranking 829th in 2024 before dropping out of the top 1,000 in 2025. Cindy began as its pet form.
Artemis in the Bible
Artemis appears in Acts 19, in the city of Ephesus, home to her great temple. A silversmith named Demetrius, who made silver shrines of Artemis, called together the craftsmen of the city and warned them that Paul was persuading people that “gods made by human hands are no gods at all,” and that the temple of the great goddess would be discredited (Acts 19:24–27). The crowd began shouting, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” and rushed into the theater. When a Jew named Alexander tried to speak to them, “they all shouted in unison for about two hours: ‘Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!’” (Acts 19:34). The city clerk finally quieted the crowd, reminding them that Ephesus was “the guardian of the temple of the great Artemis and of her image, which fell from heaven” (Acts 19:35).
The King James Version, like many Spanish and French Bibles, calls the goddess by her Roman name, Diana: “Great is Diana of the Ephesians.”
Is Cynthia a Christian name?
Cynthia is neither a biblical name nor the name of a well-known saint, but Christians have used it for centuries, and it is not the only name in Christian use that once belonged to a Greek goddess. Paul commends “our sister Phoebe, a deacon of the church in Cenchreae” (Romans 16:1). In Greek myth Phoebe was a Titan associated with the moon, and the name was also used as a title of Artemis. Among modern Christians who bear the name is Cynthia Bourgeault, an Episcopal priest ordained in 1979, who writes and teaches on Centering Prayer.
Is there a Saint Cynthia?
The martyr sometimes called Saint Cynthia is Quinta, also listed as Cointha, a Christian woman of Alexandria who was killed by a mob around 249, in the year before the emperor Decius ordered the persecution of Christians. Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, described her death in a letter that Eusebius quotes in his Church History. The crowd carried her to their idol temple to make her worship; when she refused, they bound her feet, dragged her through the city over the paved streets and stoned her to death (Church History 6.41). The traditional Roman Martyrology commemorates her as Saint Cointha on 8 February.
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