# Why do so many Hispanic last names end with z? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 13, 2011, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355 "2011-06-13T20:48:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![A.Gwilliam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ea5d25/32.png) [@A.Gwilliam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A.Gwilliam)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/41 "2011-06-15T04:10:13Z")
> [@bordelond](#): > > Ah, I see, I wasn’t counting “first-name” surnames like “George” or “Victor” as patronymics. Of course, they very well could have been father-derived names way back when. I’m not sure that “George” as an English first name is that old; no older than the seventeenth century, perhaps. And “Victor” has hardly been a common name over the years. Maybe even “Mark” has been uncommon outside of Wales (with its different religious influences). My guess is that it’s that uncommonality that’s the reason why these names don’t have “regular” patronymic surname equivalents: the formation of those sorts of surnames probably relates to a fairly narrow period of English history. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/42 "2011-06-15T05:29:25Z")
George was the first name of “false fleeting perjured Clarence”, brother of Edward IV and Richard III, in the mid 1400s. So that one at least dates back a bit. If Mark is anywhere near that old, it would be a very rare name, except as you note in Wales. ---
**Author:** ![toofs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4491bb/32.png) [@toofs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/toofs)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/43 "2011-06-15T09:18:53Z")
> [@Toucanna](#): > > Perhaps because no one wants to be likened to “Sancho Panza” (Sancho Beer-gut) in Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra’s _Don Quixote de la Mancha_? > Also, in Mexico, “El Sancho” is slang for the married woman’s lover who sneaks into the house once the husband has gone off to work or if the husband is in jail. Interesting discussion on “el Sancho”: [el sanchez/el sancho | WordReference Forums](http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1068292) In English, Sancho translates to Jody. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/44 "2011-06-15T14:23:11Z")
> [@A.Gwilliam](#): > > I’m not sure that “George” as an English first name is that old; no older than the seventeenth century, perhaps. :shrug: From the Wiki page of St. George: > [@](#): > > St. George is the patron saint of England; his cross forms the national flag of England, and features within the Union Flag of the United Kingdom. Traces of the cult of Saint George in England pre-date the Norman Conquest in the eleventh century; by the fourteenth century the saint had been declared both the patron saint and the protector of the royal family. Now then: perhaps for one reason or another, it was an uncommon given name for a few centuries there. Also, I’d have expected “Georges” and “Marc” to have been popularized by the French-influenced generations following the Norman Conquest. “Victor” is a very old name derived from Latin. It could have been introduced to the British Isles during the times of Roman occupation, or come in through the Normans. Again, though … it might not have been a very popular given name. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/45 "2011-06-15T14:33:23Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > If Mark is anywhere near that old, it would be a very rare name, except as you note in Wales. 😕 Mark is one of the New Testament evangelists. The given name “Mark” may have been more or less avoided by the English, but I think the name it unquestionably old enough to have been known at the time last names became common. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/46 "2011-06-15T14:36:51Z")
What is the actual etymology of the suffix -_ez_? How is it derived from anything meaning ‘son of’? What was the older form? I’m not coming up with any ideas except the Latin attributive suffix -_ensis_, which otherwise in Spanish became the suffix -_és_ (as in _francés_, _inglés_). I wonder if the personal name suffix _-ez_ and the ethno- or place name suffix _-és_ are from the same origin, only not spelled the same. Agadez in Niger is not an example of this, despite how it looks. That name is [derived](http://www.wikimazigh.com/wiki/Encyclopedie-Amazighe/Encyclo/Agadez-Linguistique) from the Tuareg Berber language Tamasheq, from a consonantal root _g-d-z_ possibly meaning something like ‘to gather together’, ‘to visit’, ‘hearth’, or ‘family’. ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/47 "2011-06-15T14:37:08Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > -es names are usually Portuguese: Gomes, Lopes, etc. So it’s a Portuguese spelling? 'Cause all these people I know are from Mexico. Maybe the spelling slowly crept north from Brazil 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/48 "2011-06-15T14:57:02Z")
> [@bordelond](#): > > 😕 > > Mark is one of the New Testament evangelists. The given name “Mark” may have been more or less avoided by the English, but I think the name it unquestionably old enough to have been known at the time last names became common. I meant old/rare _as an English given name_. You are of course correct, and examples of Marks/-cs/-cos from Romance countries are easy to find. > [@Markxxx](#): > > So it’s a Portuguese spelling? 'Cause all these people I know are from Mexico. Maybe the spelling slowly crept north from Brazil 🙂 It’s the Portuguese standard usage, and a relatively uncommon variant in parts of Spain – exactly what parts, I’m not sure, but I’ve seen examples of it as an unquestionably Spanish, not Portuguese or Portuguese-derived, surname. Maybe **Nava** or one of the others with more thorough knowledge of Spanish regionalisms may be able to help. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/49 "2011-06-15T15:01:06Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > What is the actual etymology of the suffix -_ez_? How is it derived from anything meaning ‘son of’? What was the older form? I’m not coming up with any ideas except the Latin attributive suffix -_ensis_, which otherwise in Spanish became the suffix -_és_ (as in _francés_, _inglés_). I wonder if the personal name suffix _-ez_ and the ethno- or place name suffix _-és_ are from the same origin, only not spelled the same. Haven’t dug into this deeply, but I always considered these types of patronymic endings to be ultimately derived from some kind of a [genitive case\*\* ending](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genitive_case). That’s opposed to patronymic forms such as _Fitz-_, which are traceable to a specific word meaning “son”. \*\*\* the link is for the house, **Johanna** – I know you’re familiar with this.\* ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/50 "2011-06-15T15:01:46Z")
Galicia? Portuguese-speaking citizens of Spain from Galicia would have wound up in New Spain (i.e. Mexico etc.) rather than Brazil. > [@bordelond](#): > > Haven’t dug into this deeply, but I always considered these types of patronymic endings to be ultimately derived from some kind of a [genitive case\*\* ending](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genitive_case). That’s opposed to patronymic forms such as _Fitz-_, which are traceable to a specific word meaning “son”. > > \*\*\* the link is for the house, **Johanna** – I know you’re familiar with this.\* A Latin plural genitive or else a third declension genitive? Those were the ones that ended in -_s_. The more familiar first and second declension singular genitives are _-i, -ae, i_. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/51 "2011-06-15T15:08:38Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > … examples of Marks/-cs/-cos from Romance countries are easy to find. Spun off from the earlier question about “Markson”, I am just now realizing that the Spanish equivalent – Márquez – is quite common. What were some of you saying about the given name “Mark” perhaps, at one time, being common in Wales but more or less unused in England? The patron saint of Wales is St. David, correct? So the name “Mark” had some other significance for the Welsh? ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/52 "2011-06-15T15:13:22Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > A Latin plural genitive or else a third declension genitive? Those were the ones that ended in -_s_. Maybe, but I wasn’t necessarily thinking that patronymic _-ez_ was Latin-derived. Could have been borrowed from Germanic, or could be holdover from a substrate language. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/53 "2011-06-15T15:13:28Z")
too late for edit— I meant It would have to have been a Latin [third declension](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_Declensions#Third_declension_.28i.29) singular genitive, or else a [fourth declension](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_Declensions#Fourth_declension_.28u.29) plural genitive? Those are the only ones that end in -_s_. new edit— Or was it from [Gothic](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gothic_declension) of the Visigoths, because Germanic genitives have the original Proto-Indo-European genitive ending in \*-_s_? ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/54 "2011-06-15T15:27:47Z")
[Iberian](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iberian_language#Morphology) has a personal possessive in -_r_. Looks like a miss, except that in historical linguistics it isn’t unknown to have /r/\>/z/ (even in the history of English and Latin). [Basque](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_grammar#Declension) genitives in -_ko_ or -_aren_. The first is a miss, the second maybe a hit, as long as you can work up another /r/\>/z/ and lose the /n/. But I kind of doubt Basque had anything to do with it. The Basques were too busy being ancestors to half of the unrelated languages around the world\* to bother with loaning genitives to Spanish. \*bit of linguistic sarcasm ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/55 "2011-06-15T15:54:32Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > Or was it from [Gothic](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gothic_declension) of the Visigoths, because Germanic genitives have the original Proto-Indo-European genitive ending in \*-_s_? Not that I’ve got a stack of evidence in front of me, but this is where I’d cast my vote. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/56 "2011-06-15T16:08:58Z")
> [@bordelond](#): > > Not that I’ve got a stack of evidence in front of me, but this is where I’d cast my vote. Yeah. So that would make it cognate to the English suffix -_s_ as in “Richards.” (Keith Richards or Keith Richard? I could never remember which was which…) ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/57 "2011-06-15T16:14:06Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > (Keith Richards or Keith Richard? I could never remember which was which…) Both, per his Wiki page: > [@](#): > > After the Rolling Stones signed to Decca in 1963, their band manager, Andrew Loog Oldham, dropped the “s” from his surname believing “Keith Richard”, in his words, “looked more pop”. (In the late 1970s Richards reestablished the “s” to his surname.) ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/58 "2011-06-15T17:10:15Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > Anglo patronymics can go even further afield – > > Aitken - son of Adam > Hancock - son of John > Hodgekiss - son of Roger > Saunders - son of Alexander > Dobbins, Hobbes - son of Robert > Whatley - son of Walter These aren’t all patronymics. Aitken—diminutive of a hypocoristic form of Adam. (Ad \< short form of Adam + -ken, Scottish diminutive suffix equivalent to German -chen) Hancock—diminutive of a hypocoristic form of John. (Han \< short form of Johan + -cock, diminutive suffix) Hodgekiss—diminutive of a hypocoristic form of Roger. (Hodge \< rhyming form of Rodge \< short form of Rodger + -kin, English diminutive suffix equivalent to German -chen) + -s, possibly the possessive used as a patronymic and possibly a diminutive (cf. “Wills” for Prince William) Saunders \< short form of Alexander + -s, possibly the possessive used as a patronymic and possibly a diminutive (cf. “Wills” for Prince William) Dobbins—diminutive of a hypocoristic form of Robert. (Dobb \< rhyming form of Rob \< short form of Robert + -(k)in, English diminutive suffix equivalent to German -chen) + -s, possibly the possessive used as a patronymic and possibly a diminutive (cf. “Wills” for Prince William) Whatley: field of wheat (“wheat lea”). ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/59 "2011-06-15T17:16:10Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > These aren’t all patronymics. Any diminutive or hypocorism used as a patronymic is a patronymic, the same way that a completely unaltered given name that is used as a patronymic is also a patronymic. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355/60 "2011-06-15T17:37:47Z")
In other words, any given name or form of a given name that appears in the surname position is in form a patronymic, regardless of how in any particular case the name was actually acquired (i.e., whether or not a particular person bearing that name actually had an ancestor with that name as a given name), the same way that a word referring to a profession that appears in the surname position is an occupational name regardless of whether the person bearing that name actually had an ancestor that held that occupation. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-hispanic-last-names-end-with-z/585355.md?page=4)