Etymology

Vladimir

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Today it means: A transliteration of the Bulgarian, Macedonian, Pannonian Rusyn, Russian, or Serbo-Croatian male given name Владимир (Vladimir), equivalent to Volodymyr, popular throughout the history of Slavic countries and societies. Full definition →

Russian Владимир ← Old East Slavic Володимѣръ ← Old Church Slavonic Владимѣръ
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The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European · derived from*h₂welh₁-“be strong”
  2. Proto-Slavic · derived from*Voldiměrъ
  3. Old Church Slavonic · derived fromВладимѣръ
  4. Old East Slavic · derived fromВолодимѣръ
  5. Russian · borrowed fromВладимир
  6. English todayVladimir

From Russian Владимир (Vladimir), as well as from other Slavic cognates, and reinforced by Medieval Latin Vladimirus, name of several saints in the Eastern Orthodox Church, from Old East Slavic Володимѣръ (Volodiměrŭ), Old Church Slavonic Владимѣръ (Vladiměrŭ), from Proto-Slavic *Voldiměrъ (which see for more), equivalent to владь (vladĭ, “power”) (which is from Proto-Indo-European *h₂welh₁- (“be strong”)) and мѣръ (měrŭ, “great”), changed by folk etymology into миръ (mirŭ, “peace”). Compare Waldemar.

Words from the same roots

Old East SlavicВолодимѣръ all →

Volodymyr

Proto-Indo-European*h₂welh₁- all →

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Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.