Artemisia comes from Greek tradition, linked to Artemis, the goddess of the hunt and moon.
Artemisia is a name of magnificent classical weight, derived directly from Artemis, the Greek goddess of the hunt, the moon, wilderness, and childbirth. The goddess's name may itself derive from a pre-Greek Anatolian root, or from the Greek 'artemes,' meaning safe and sound. The plant artemisia — the genus that includes wormwood and mugwort — was named for the goddess due to its ancient medicinal applications, particularly in women's health, which the divine huntress was said to govern.
History furnished the name with two extraordinary bearers. Artemisia I of Caria, the 5th-century BCE queen who commanded her own fleet for the Persian king Xerxes at the Battle of Salamis, was so formidable that Herodotus devoted extensive passages to her tactical cunning — she was one of very few female commanders whose deeds Herodotus considered worthy of heroic treatment. Centuries later, Artemisia Gentileschi (1593–1656) became one of the most skilled painters of the Italian Baroque, a contemporary of Caravaggio whose dramatic canvases depicting Judith, Susanna, and other defiant women have been reappraised as landmarks of feminist artistic expression.
For centuries Artemisia remained a name of scholarly and aristocratic circles, primarily in Italy and Greece. In the 21st century it has experienced a quiet renaissance among parents drawn to grand classical names with genuine historical heft. It carries with it the full weight of the ancient world — the silver moon, the sacred hunt, and two women who refused to be minor figures in their respective eras.