When did we get regularized last names, as opposed to indicators of place or profession or one’s parents? Was the switch gradual or sudden? Why did some people have last names as far back as the Middle Ages (Geoffrey Chaucer and Thomas More), and others didn’t?
It’s strange – I have a passion for history and literature, and yet I’ve never once come across a reference to what seems to me to be a very significant change. Can anyone help me out here?
[Hamish] I swear there was a thread about this, not too long ago, but I’ve searched and can’t find it. Maybe someone else can help. I even vaguely remember that the rulers of certain countries had their subjects take surnames for a purpose (not taxes, which would make sense).
It wasn’t until 1938 that Turkey passed the Soyadï Kanunu (Family Name Ordinance) that required all Turks to choose a last name. Until then, they’d all gotten along just fine without them. There was a similar law in Iran about the same time.
To this day in Malaysia, Indonesia, and Mongolia, the Malays, Indians, and Mongols still get along just fine without last names. The Chinese in those countries, however, have always used family names (not last names; they put the family names first in China as in Hungary).
Leave us not forget the Romans had family names. Julius Caesar’s was Julius.
Different segments of the population would have acquired them at different times. I think surnames were viewed as something that added importance to the individual. But generaly the 14th and 15th centuries was when the practice became common place. Mind you I am a historian but this is unresearched speil.
I know that many (but not all) Jews in Europe did not have surnames until 1800. When Napoleon conquered Europe, he required his subjects to take surnames. I have a feeling that this likely affected non-Jews as well.
My family didn’t acquire a surname until 1900, and it was imposed by US Customs. Family story has it that when they arrived the guy with the clipboard asked them (in English) what their name was and they, not speaking English, said something along the lines of “what did you say?”. At some point they were assigned a name from a list and there you have it. Becuase the immediate family came over in three batches, for awhile there were three surnames among the brothers and sisters but eventually they settled on one, got some name changes, and there you have it.
One of my college acquaintances was from Iceland, where they apparently do not have surnames to this day but patrynomics. Thus, the son of Johan is Johanson and the daughter of Johan is Johansdottir. So some of us in this world, even today, have not yet acquired a “last name”.
I happen to know an Icelandic artist by the name of Kjartan Arnorrson that sounds like a first and last name to me. Of course his nickname is “Karno”, that might mean something in Icelandic.
My family has had a last name since before 1500, and they are certainly not nobility. Western European tradesmen, and artisans, mostly, with a few disreputables of no given profession. Several of the women married in the earliest years have no last name given at the time of marriage.
Members of the family still reside in the ancestral hometown in Germany, with the same last name, and records including the same earliest ancestors. Family records from before 1500 are no longer extent, nor does the name appear in the scant public records that survive from that time. That does not mean the name came from that period, but I have no proof that it has earlier usage.
Spelling changed a bit, in the first hundred years, among descendants. My own family uses the most common early variant spelling, although even recent family branches differ on pronunciation. Title to that part of Germany was disputed, and Alsace was at times French, German, and independent.
Tris
“Swat my hind with a mellon rind, That’s my penguin state of mind.” ~ Opus ~
I believe the Icelandic tradition is to form the last name from the first name of the parent of the same gender. This his father’s name was probably Arnorr Somebodyelseson.
As we now quote from the book of Smith (Elsdon C. Smith,Paragon Books, 1979,p. 31)
"A curious, early instance of the name is that found in the Petrie papyri, a discovery of Professor J.P. Mahaffy. These contain a list of names, and he says: “There is one which appears regularly in the same form, and of which we can give no further explanation. It is the name Smith–unmistakable written. We have never found anything like it before, and it is surely worht telling the many distinguieshed bearers fo the name that there weas a man known as Smith in the twentieth year of the third Ptolemy, 227 B.C., and that he was occupied in brewing beer or in selling it. Is there any other Englis name comparable to this in antiquity?”
I’ve just read in our local paper that in Nepal people commonly have no last name, and when they travel outside the country they usually use “Sherpa” or “Lama” on their passports.
Are you sure about that? One of my favourtie singers is named Bjork Gudmundsdottir. She’s Icelandic, and says she got her family name from her mother, Gudmund.
But then, this is the woman who once described plastic as “the most natural material in the world.”
Well, if the father is unknown they’d probably use the mother’s name - a common enough practice whether you’re talking about patrynomics or genuine surnames.
Speaking of Bjork, maybe someone could explain how in Iceland — a land with presumably 100% Indo-European (Norse) population — there could appear a person with such a non-Indo-European looking face. Could she be descended from Skraelings brought back by Leif Erikson?