Surnames

[71silverfox]

Surnames are supposed to originate from tradesmen etc from history - but how and when do new surnames come about? Do new surnames get created regularly - and how, and why?

[Clanad]

In the U.S., literally thousands of new surnames were created during the mass immigration waves, especially the ones involving Scandanavian countries. I have numerous Norwegian friends whose grandparents immigrated in the late 1800's or early 1900's whose names were changed, either through their own requests or through the immigration official's inability to understand or correctly write the names given by the immigrant. A close friends surname is now Vigstol but was originally Olsen. The grand dad didn't wish to be among the hundreds of Olsen's flooding the country so changed it (supposedly a village name in Norway)...

[ladorada]

1.
In my country, gypsy people use to give funny names to their children. For example, they give them names of cars (Mercedesa, which is the feminine for the well-known trademark) or of renown beers (Stella Artois, spelled Stela Artoa).

2.
I know a man, Ion, and a woman, Elena, who had a child and decided to give him a name which contained both his mother and father's names. So they named him Elion, El from Elena and -ion from his father's name. Later they found that the name was a transposition of 'Ionel', which is a diminutive of Ion. Ionel is a kind of Johnny.

[71silverfox]

So are your parents called Lada and Labrador? ;)

[joko]

don't really think there is much need these days as people just take their parents surnames.
i think most would just choose a known name if they wanted to change it.

i expect there are a few made up but not many.... perhaps double barrelled ones or an attempt to creat a new word from the letters of the two lovers names

i wonder if, with the rise of internet use and the obvious need for people to create usernames, whether people will start to change their real names for their username or it will encourage people to experiment?

[enfable]

I believe that in Iceland (and I think Norway) males and females with the same parents have different surnames. The males suffixed with sen (son) and the females (dotia) daughter. These are prefixed with the fathers surname so in a family of 4; mother, father, son and daughter could all have different surnames.

[jim_lauchlan]

I believe that in Mexico I *understand* a child takes both the surname of father and mother and has a double-barrelled name if you like.

[71silverfox]

So how does that work when they get older? If that was the case they would have double-double barrelled names! Where would it stop? lol