How do Russians and other societies with patronyms handle illegitimacy?

[Malleus_Incus_Stapes]

@Kyla

Someone asked this question here when I was still living in Eastern Europe, so I asked some of my colleagues. They were confounded by the question, and had no idea. I guess it doesn’t come up very often. By the way, they are also always confounded to realize that I don’t have a patronym for a middle name. The idea that parents can just pick a random middle name was just crazy to them. Even the ethnic Turks had patronyms - they just had their father’s first name (without the -ov or -ova) as their middle name. (So, Ivana, daughter of Ivan was Ivana Ivanova, and Cibel daughter of Mehmed was Cibel Mehmed.)

Modern Hebrew names aren’t patronymic, so it isn’t an issue. I mean, there are people who have names that look patronymic, but they’re almost always made-up, created by people who were shedding their old Eastern European names. I guess that some people really did use their father’s name to create a new one, but then they were passed on to their children, instead of their children creating a new one based on their own father. (Wikipedia has an article on this topic.) And then sometimes they’re creative. When I lived in Israel, I once wondered if there are any people who adopted “Bat-_____” names, to indicate if they are the daughter of someone, rather than the son. I looked it up in my phone book and yup, there were a couple listed. I remember specifically that one was Yael Bat-Yam, which translates as “Fawn Daughter of the Sea”. (Oh, Israeli names.) You know she just made that up.

It is an issue for traditional Jews, though. A lot of ceremonies, such as calling a man up to read the Torah, use his Hebrew patronymic. I don’t know what exactly is done, because the “Ask the Rabbi” chat on askmoses.com is down, but if I remember I’ll check with them later.
If a Jewish person’s parent is not known at the time- say, Manny Goldstein was in a car accident, and his friends don’t know what his mother calls himself- he’d be called “son of Abraham our father/Sarah our mother” (depending on whether he’s in a patronymic or matronymic situation).

(Oh, and a yael is an ibex. Close enough).

[Polycarp]

@Malleus_Incus_Stapes

(Oh, and a yael is an ibex. Close enough).

Very off topic, but I wonder if that nails down the origin of this legendary beast.