Chapter LXXV: Section XVIII: Alethea, &c

Ἀλήθεια (Aletheia), truth, came from α and λήθω (to hide), and thus means openness and sincerity.

When it first came to be used as a name is not clear. Aletha, of Padua, appears in 1411; and the princess, on whose account Charles I., when Prince of Wales, made his journey to Spain, was Doña Maria Aletea. About that time Alethea made her appearance in the noble family of Saville, and either to a real or imaginary Alethea were addressed the famous lines of the captive cavalier:—

“Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage.”

Moreover, in 1669, Alethea Brandling, at the age of nine, was married to one Henry Hitch, esq., and the name occurs several times in Durham pedigrees.

As far as the English Alethea is concerned, she is probably the alteration of an Irish name, for she chiefly belongs to the other island, and is there called Letty. What feminine it was meant to translate must be uncertain, perhaps Tuathflaith (the noble lady). Tom Moore called his Egyptian heroine Atethe, from the adjective, and this has been in consequence sometimes used as a name.

The name Althea must not be confounded with it. This last is Ἄλθεια (wholesome). It belonged of old to the unfortunate mother of Meleager, and now designates a genus of mallows, in allusion to their healing power.

We find the prefix πρό, forming part of the word προκοπή (progress), whence the name Προκόπιος (Prokopios); in Latin, Procopius, progressive. It was the name of a martyr under Diocletian, in Palestine, and is a favourite in the Greek Church. The short-lived successor of Jovian was so called; also the great Byzantine historian; and now Prokopij is very common among the Russian clergy; and Prokop or Prokupek has found its way into Bohemia. Russia, likewise, uses in the form of Prokhor, the name of Próchorus (Πρόχορας), one of the seven deacons, and much Græcized indeed must the imaginations of his Jewish parents have been when they gave him such an appellation, signifying the leader of the choral dances in the Greek theatres.