I meant to ask this question yesterday but I forgot. I noticed that many Irish-Americans have Spanish (or Spanish-sounding) last names. For example, I’ve known or heard about Irish people with last names like Costello, Esposito, etc. I know there are others but I can’t seem to remember them now. What is the reason for this?
Costello actually derives, by a pretty torturous route, from the Norman name Jocelyn. You don’t want me to explain how this happened, trust me. Its resemblance to Spanish is purely coincidental. BTW, in Ireland the emphasis is on the first syllable.
I’ve never heard of an Irish person surnamed Esposito.
And before anyone suggests it, the whole Spanish-Armada-colonising-Ireland story is bunk. Cecil covered this pretty thoroughly.
Damn that Devaney. I bought his Spanish explanation hook, line and sinker back at university. Any idea about the etymology on that one?
However, the Spanish did do extensive trade with Ireland, especially with Galway, in the 14th through 16th century, and Galway has the famous “Spanish Arch” to show for it.
Do some Irish names come from Spanish Armada survivors?
And before anyone else brings it up, the Irish leader Eamon de Valera had a Spanish name because he was in fact half Spanish.
I’ve always seen “Esposito” as an Italian family name, not Spanish.
I’ve never seen it as an Irish name.
Paddy O’Furniture?
Seamus Always
There actually is an Irish-Mexican connection which may account for Irish with Spanish names. During the Mexican-American War of the 1840s a number of Irish soldiers deserted from the US Army and fought for Mexico; they were known as the San Patricos (sp?) Battalion. Many of them were captured and killed, but I’m sure there were some who stayed in Mexico after the war.
I used to listen to KCRW public radio when I lived in SoCal, and they had a guy who would do storied from San Francisco’s Castro District whose name is Cloudy O’Sanchez. Wouldn’t quite figure that one out. Some sort of Spanish-Irish connection there…
[sub]Okay, his name is Claudio Sanchez. But I always liked to think of him as Cloudy O’Sanchez. [/sub]
“Couldn’t quite figure that one out.”
NPR has a strange penchant for having commentators and newscasters with oddly confusing names, as was discussed here.
Then there are all the Irish names that turn up in South America, like Fitzcarraldo and Bernardo O’Higgins. I used to kid a Bolivian co-worker that he needed a fine, authentic South American last name like O’Higgins or Stroessner or Fujimori.
The Flight of the Wind Geese, maybe, or the Submission of Tyrone? From the time of Strongbow right through the Cromwellian oppression and King Billy’s War and the 1798 United Irishmen uprising there were a fair number of Irish exiles going to Spain, I have been told.
I was in Spanish Point (the place were the Armada stranded) this Paddy’s day. As far as I remember they did not make love to any survivers. They killed them instead.
What? They killed them? Last Wednesday?
Glad I stayed at home then !
It’s a dangerous place, alright. 
I spoke to my friend with the last name ‘Esposito’, who I always believed to be 100% Irish since she gets so pumped up for St. Patrick’s Day. It turns out that she’s 7/8 Irish, but her father’s father’s father was Italian and that name carried through. Thanks for the answers and links.
[hijack]
My high school was founded in 1925 as a place where the sons of the “railroad” Irish could get a good Catholic education. The mascot, quite naturally, is the Fighting Irish.
It never failed to crack me up, though, whenever I’d go to a football game and hear the announcer calling out the names on the roster.
“And on the home team, playing for the Fighting Irish, we have Gonzalez, Portillo, Escarciga, Hernandez, Acosta, Armendariz, Ruiz, Gutierrez…”
[/hijack]
James Patrick Rodriguez checking in.
Top o’ the manana!
In these parts it’s the Catholic connection that makes for a natural blend.