I’m wondering about the frequent z’s at the end of Spanish surnames - Fernandez, Gomez, Hernandez, Sanchez, Gonzalez, etc. It seems that the endings of many surnames in other languages signal “son of” and I wonder if there’s an etymological similarity in these names. Can anyone take a swing at this? Thanks. xo, C.
As I understand it, it’s a relic of the Germanic invasions in the early Middle Ages, specifically Visigothic I believe. The -ez ending is a cousin to the English –’s and German –s. So Rodriguez is Germanic Hrôd- ‘fame’ + -rîc- ‘power’ + -s genitive case marker. The etymology comes from the Oxford Dictionary of First Names (that is, English first names, so I can’t help with Gomez), the only such dictionary I’ve ever found which is even mildly trustworthy. They also list a Germanic origin for Ferdinand ( > Fernandez, Hernandez). Martinez and Sanchez have Latin roots (probably ultimately ‘Mars’ [the god] and ‘Sanctus’ [holy]) plus the Gothic genitive ending. Gonzales seems to be a hybrid, from Gund- ‘strife’ plus Latin ‘salvus.’
From this I take two things:
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these common names do not have common ancestry
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the z on the end is the equivalent of the apostrophe s at the end of a person’s name, indicating possession. So that Rodriquez could be more or less back-formed to The Guys That Have Fame and Power.
Do I have this more or less correct?
Gonzalo (presumably from the same source) was also a not-too-rare first name at one time. Wonder if it’s much used these days?
Some of these Spanish surnames seem to have congeners in French (Rodriguez/Rodrigue, Dominguez/Domangue) while others seem not to (Gomez, Gonzales). Seems the Visigoths and/or other Germanic folk were traipsing all over Western Europe at the time, so one can wonder why the same names aren’t evenly distributed over the area (or maybe they are?).
Good Wikipedia find here – it shows the most common surnames in a few dozen countries. Scroll down to some of the Spanish-speaking nations (Argentina is a handy one), and you can follow links to various surnames and their etymologies.
Most excellent find. Supports my hunch that z indicates son of. I guess it’s the old version of, “Hey, you must be Justin’s kid.” “Yep, that’s me, Justin’s.”
Dr Drake did a good job, but took it back a few notches to the origins of the given names. Quite simply, most of the -ez surnames are coinages on the analogy of Jones, Wills, and the various English -son surnames.
Rodrigo – > Rodriguez
Gonzalo --> Gonzalez
Sancho --> Sanchez
Martin (Mar-TEEN in Spanish, sometimes with accent over the I) --> Martinez
The early Kings of Navarre (paging Nava!) had regnal names that were, for example, Sancho Iñiguez, meaning "Sancho son of Iñigo.
Of course, Spanish, like most Indo-European languages, derived surnames from a variety of sources: fossilized patronymics, occupations, locations, etc. “De la Cruz” meant “of/from the cross,” either as being from a location where a cross was prominently displayed or signifying an ancestor’s devotion to the Cross of Christ. “De la Torre” likewise is “of/from the tower.” “Fonseca” means “dry spring” (of water, not the season) and presumably signifies that the bearer’s ancestors lived near a spring that dried up.
Too bad the Wikipedia link usually doesn’t go into the Germanic origins. Rodrigo may be more easily recognized as related to Roderick, for English speakers.
Some of those Visigothic and Vandal kings had odd-appearing names, and I can only wonder how, and if, they have been Hispanicized. For instance, I recall one named “Rensesswith”.
Speaking of fossilized names, it’s interesting to run into a Central American immigrant who looks to be a nearly if not totally pureblood Amerind, but who has a name like Nestor or Ulysse. Here’s an artifact that started in Greece, then went to Italy, then Spain, and finally to Honduras or Guatamala, over thousands of years of history.
You can see a similar sound in Serbo-Croatian with the suffix -ić. Nikolić from Nikola, Radić from Radeslav, and a whole bunch more. The -ić is a diminuitive ending, like Spanish -ito, and it is often combined with -ov (a possessive), leading to names like Jovanović from a father named Jovan.
Jovanović would literally translate to Jovan’s little son.
Grandiose classical or literary names are very common here in Panama. Besides Nestor and Ulises you may find Arquimedes, Aristedes, Omar, Hector, Alcibiades, Aladino (Alladin), Baltisar, Nefertaris (I suppose from Nefertiti), Demostenes, Saturnino, etc. The peasant with a hifalutin first name and a pedestrian last name is virtually a stereotype.
Most of these names are also often seen spelled with an s; Gonzales and Rodrigues are especially common. The few people I’ve met with the names Lopes and Gomes all seem to pronounce them as if they were English, with the e silent.
Colibri: Not to forget Hipolito, a fairly common name in parts of Latin America. Nefertaris is probably referring to Rameses II’s queen, Nefertari, not to Nefertiti (much more famous today thanks to the Polychrome Bust and her association with Akhnaten than she was in most of Egyptian history). It should not be forgotten that there were in pre-Alexandrinian times Greek colonies along the Mediterranean littoral of Spain, and even a couple on the Atlantic approaches to Gibraltar, so some of the Greco-Hispanic derivation was direct, not via the Romans.
Biffy: I’m going to defer to a better dialectitian than I on the issue, but my impression is that the surnames in -es (where one might expect -ez by analogy with other Spanish names) are either Portuguese or from areas influenced by the Portuguese.