ARTEMA. — A disciple and collaborator of St Paul who, in 64 or 65, hypothetically designated him for Crete to replace Titus, summoned to join the Apostle at Nicopolis (Tit. 3:12).
The name ‘Αρτεμίας, a contracted form of ‘Αρτεμίωρος, ‘gift of Artemis’, was common in Asia Minor; St Jerome (De nomin. hebraicis), mistakenly taking it for a Hebrew name, interprets it as ‘anathematizans seu conturbans’. Perhaps A. was from Ephesus, a centre of the cult of Artemis.
Later traditions, collected by Pseudo-Dorotheus (Biblioth. Maxima, III, Lyons 1677, p. 429), include A. among the seventy (or seventy-two) disciples. The Synaxarium Constantinopolitanum calls him bishop of Lystra in Lycaonia and places his feast on 30 June. The Roman Martyrology commemorates him on 21 June. In the Byzantine Menaea an Artemius is venerated on 28 April, but this seems to be a different person.