1309: samuel Jul 11, 2018

While plenty of names from Biblical Hebrew changed and morphed in different ways to create a diverse array of derivatives such as with John and 'Jacob'. Others, however, have changed relatively little over the millennia and through different cultures. 'Samuel', for instance, either comes from שם האלוהים (Shem Alohim) or שמע אלוהים (Sh'ma Alohim) meaning "G*d has heard" or "name of G*d". This same shift from [ʃ] to [s] is also a factor with names like 'Simon'. Similar names to 'Samuel' exist all over Europe with very little difference, unlike those aforementioned others. However, it is unclear where the probably related Samantha comes from, though likely it is a Greek compound.
Make sure to check out the new Word Facts Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTKKSf35LSE&t=10s. Support Word Facts on Patreon for new things and to help make the content better: https://www.patreon.com/wordfacts.