Lucian

Lucian has the soft glow of its own meaning. From the Latin Lucius, rooted in lux, "light," it belonged to saints, Roman emperors, and the satirist Lucian of Samosata in the second century. The name has long been a staple in Eastern Europe, particularly in Romania, and has lately gained American ground as parents look beyond the shorter Lucas and Luke; it now sits at 485. Two syllables arrive fluid and unhurried, with the palatal middle consonant giving it continental polish. Lucian reads as romantic, literary, and quietly luminous, a name that would be equally at home in a novel or a Milanese gallery.