Patronymic

A patronymic, or patronym, is a component of a personal name based on the name of one's father. A component of a name based on the name of one's mother is a matronymic, or matronym.

In many areas patronymics predate the use of surnames. They, along with the less common matronymics, are still used in Iceland, where few people have surnames. For example, the son of Pétur Marteinsson would have a different last name - Pétursson.

Many English, Welsh, Spanish, Slavic, Scottish, Manx and Scandinavian surnames originate from patronymics, e.g. Wilson (son of William), Powell (ap Hywel), Fernández (of Fernando), Carlsson (son of Carl, e.g. Erik Carlsson), Milošević (son of Miloš). Similarly, other Norse cultures which formerly used patronyms have since switched to the more widespread style of passing the father's last name to the children (and wife) as their own.

Patrynomics can simplify or complicate genealogical research. Father's first name are easily known when children bear patronymics; however, migration has frequently resulted in a switch from patronymics to surnames due to different local customs. Depending on the countries concerned, family research in the nineteenth century or earlier needs to take this into account.

In biological taxonomy, a patronym is a specific epithet which is a Latinized surname. These often honor associates of the biologist who named the organism rather than the biologist himself. Examples include Gopherus agassizii, named by James Graham Cooper after Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz, and Acacia greggii, named by botanist Asa Gray after explorer Josiah Gregg.

Worldwide

Western Europe

In Western Europe, the patronymic was formerly widespread, but latterly confined to the Nordic and Scandinavian peoples in the north west.

In Nordic languages, the patronymic was formed by using the ending -son (later -sen in Danish and Norwegian) to indicate "son of", and -dotter (Icelandic -dóttir) for "daughter of". In Iceland, patronymics are in fact compulsory by law, with a handful of exceptions ("Halldór Laxness" for example was the pen name of "Halldór Guðjónsson"). This name was generally used as a last name although a third name, a so-called byname based on location or personal characteristic was often added to differentiate people. The use of Scandinavian-style patronymics, particularly in its Danish variation with the ending -sen, was also widespread in northern Germany. This reflects the strong influence of Scandinavia in this part of Germany during the centuries.

In Finnish language, the use of patronymics instead of surnames was very common well into the 19th century. They fell out of use however, when the law was changed so that a surname was required of everyone. Patronymics were composed similarly as in Swedish language or other Scandinavian languages: the father's name and the suffix -n for genetive plus the word poika for sons, tytär for daughters. For example Tuomas Abrahaminpoika and Martta Heikintytär.

In Dutch, patronymics were often used in place of surnames or as middle names. Patronymics were composed of the father's name plus an ending -zoon for sons, -dochter for daughters. For instance, Abel Janszoon Tasman is "Abel son of Jan Tasman", and Kenau Simonsdochter Hasselaer: "Kenau, daughter of Simon Hasselaer". In written form, these endings were often abbreviated as -sz and -dr respectively eg. Jeroen Cornelisz "Jeroen son of Cornelis". The endings -s, -se and -sen were also commonly used for sons and often for daughters too. In the northern provinces, -s was almost universally used for both sons and daughters. Patronymics were common in the Dutch United Provinces until the French invasion in 1795 and subsequent annexation in 1810. As the Netherlands was now a province of France, a registry of births, deaths and marriages was established in 1811, whereupon emperor Napoleon forced the Dutch to register and adopt a distinct surname. Often, they simply made the patronymic the new surname, and modern Dutch patronymic-based surnames such as Jansen, Pietersen and Willemsen abound. (Others chose their profession as surname: Bakker (baker), Slagter (butcher) etc. Still others may have thought this "surname thing" was a passing fashion and chose fantasy names such as Keizer (emperor) or even Naaktgeboren (born naked).)

The use of "Mac" in some form, was prevalent in Scottish, Irish and Manx Gaelic. "Mc" is also a frequent anglicisation in both Scotland and Ireland. In Ireland, the forms "Mag" and "M'" are encountered. The prefix "Mac" is used to form a patronym, such as "MacCoinneach" - or the anglicized 'Mackenzie' - son of Coinneach/Kenneth. Less well known is the female equivalent of 'Mac'; 'Nic', such as NicDhòmhnaill meaning daughter of Dòmhnall or, in English, Donald; an example would be the Gaelic Mairi NicDhòmhnaill, or Mary MacDonald. In Ireland, the use of "Ó" (anglicised "O'") meaning grandson predominated over "Mac" in Gaelic there, and at the north end of the Irish Sea, in Ulster, the Isle of Man and Galloway (indeed as far north as Argyll), "Mac" was frequently truncated in speech, leading to such anglicisations as "Qualtrough" (Son of Walter) & "Quayle" (son of Paul, cf MacPhail) - usually beginning with "C", "K" or "Q". Colloquial Scottish Gaelic also has other patronymics of a slightly different form for individuals, still in use (for more information please see: Scottish Gaelic personal naming system)).

In Wales, before the 1536 Act of Union all Welsh people used patronyms as the sole way of naming people, so Rhydderch ap Watcyn was Rhydderch son of Watcyn (ap corresponds to mab - son). This gave rise to names such as Watcyn being - after the Acts of Union - used as Anglicised surnames; in this case the name Watcyn became the surname Watkin/Watkins. Up until the Industrial Revolution the use of patronyms was still widespread, especially in the South West, Mid West and North of Wales.

The archaic French prefix fitz, which is cognate with the modern French fils, meaning son, appears in England's aristocratic family lines dating from the Norman Conquest, and also among the Anglo-Irish. Thus there are names like Fitzpatrick and Fitzhugh. Of particular interest is the name Fitzroy, meaning "King's son", which was used by Royal bastards who were acknowledged as such by their fathers.

In Portugal, there are some common surnames which had a patronimic genesis, but are no longer used in such way. For instance, Álvares was the son of Álvaro and Gonçalves was the son of Gonçalo (it was the case of Nuno Álvares Pereira, son of Álvaro Gonçalves Pereira, son of Gonçalo Pereira). Other cases include Rodrigues (Rodrigo) and Nunes (Nuno).

Eastern Europe

In some Slavic languages, endings such as -vich, -vič, -vić, -wicz (all pronounced as "vich") are used to form patronymics. For example, in Russian a man named Ivan whose father's name is Nikolay would be known as Ivan Nikolayevich or "Ivan, son of Nikolay" (with Nikolayevich as a patronymic). For women, the ending is -yevna or -ovna. For masculine names ending in a vowel, such as Ilya or Foma, the corresponding endings are -ich and -inichna. The patronymic is used when addressing somebody both formally as well as among friends. A Russian will almost never formally address a person named Mikhail as just 'Mikhail', but rather as 'Mikhail' plus his patronymic (for instance, 'Mikhail Nikolayevich' or 'Mikhail Sergeyevich' etc). However, on informal occasions when a person is using the diminutive of a name, such as Misha for Mikhail, the patronymic is hardly ever used. Alternatively, on informal occasions the ending of a patronomic may be colloquially contracted: Nikolayevich -> Nikolaich, Stepan Ivanovich -> Stepan Ivanych -> Ivanych (the given name may be omitted altogether). In the case of this omission of the first name the contraction, if possible, is obligatory: Ivan Sergeyevich Sidorov may be called "Sergeich" or, more rarely, "Sergeyevich". Such contractions are not used by all as they tend to bring a shade of muzhik-style familiarity. And they are as common with women's patronymics as men's. A very famous example is "Mar' Ivanna" (Марь Иванна), short for "Maria Ivanovna" (Мария Ивановна), a young female teacher who is a constant character in Vovochka jokes.

Some West Slavic or South Slavic surnames look morphologically identical to Slavic patronymics, but they do not change form between masculine and feminine: Mila Jovovic stays "Jovovic", not "Jovovna"; and these surnames cannot be contracted using the pattern mentioned above. Examples of them are Mikhail Andreyevich Miloradovich and Vladislav Khodasevich.

In Hungarian patronyms were once formed with the ending -fi (sometimes spelled as -fy). This system is no longer in common use, though it was common centuries ago and can still be found in some frequent present-day surnames such Pálfi (son of Paul), Győrfi, Bánfi or in the name of the famous poet Sándor Petőfi.

In Romanian, the endings -escu and -eanu were used, like Petrescu - son of Petre (Peter); many of the current Romanian family names were formed like this.

In Polish, the endings -ski or -ska are used (-ski in a man, -ska in a woman, i.e. Mr. Kochanowski, Ms./Mrs. Kochanowska, the Kochanowski family), at times "anow" precedes the "ski". Meaning "son of Koch" and "daughter of Koch," when many Poles came to America the second or third generation of girls were born with the surname Kochanowski instead of Kochanowska.

Middle East

In Armenian, the endings -ian and -yan are used, e.g. Jafarian. Many of the current Armenian family names were formed like this, though the root is often based on a trait of the namesake rather than the actual name. -oglu and -ov are also sometimes used by Armenians in Turkey and Russia, respectively.

In Aramaic, the prefix bar- means "son" and is used as a prefix meaning "son of." In the Bible, Peter is called Bar-jonah in Matthew 16:17 and Nathanael is possibly called Bartholomew because he is the son of Tolmai. The titles can also be figurative, for example in Acts 4:36-37 a man named Joseph is called Barnabas meaning son of consolation. The prefix ben- is used similarly in Hebrew.

In Arabic, the word "ibn" (or "bin" and sometimes "ibni" and "ibnu" to show the final declension of the noun) is the equivalent of the "son" prefix discussed above. In addition, "binte" means "daughter of". Thus, for example, "Ali ibn Amr" means "Ali son of Amr". The word "Abu" means "father of", so "Abu Ali" is another name for "Amr". In medieval times, a bastard of unknown parentage would sometimes be termed "ibn Abihi", "son of his father" (notably Ziyad ibn Abihi.) In the Qur'an, Jesus (Isa in Arabic) is consistently termed "Isa ibn Maryam" - a matronymic - because, in Muslim belief, he had no biological father. An Arabic patronymic can be extended as far back as family tree records will allow: thus, for example, Ibn Khaldun gives his own full name as "Abd ar-Rahman ibn Muhammad ibn Muhammad ibn Muhammad ibn al-Hasan ibn Muhammad ibn Jabir ibn Muhammad ibn Ibrahim ibn Abd ar-Rahman ibn Khaldun". Patronymics are still standard in parts of the Arab world, notably Saudi Arabia; however, most of the Arab world has switched to a family name system. As in English, the new family names are sometimes based on what was formerly a patronymic.

The Arabic patronymic tradition has been adopted by the Malaysian Malays, who give both sons and daughters patronyms with the structure of bin (for sons) and binti (for daughters) as the middle word of the name. An example name of "Ahmad bin Fadzil" means "Ahmad son of Fadzil", while the example of "Aina binti Md. Daud" means "Aina daughter of Md. Daud".

Jewish usage

The Jewish people historically used patronymic names. Permanent family surnames exist today but this did not come until much later in history. The Jewish patronymic system is done with the first name followed by ben or bat depending on the gender, and then followed by the father’s name. Examples include David ben Yitzhak or Miryam bat Yaakov where ben means son of and bat means daughter of. While Jews now have permanent surnames for everyday life, this form is still exclusively used in religious life. It is used in synagogue and in Jewish legal documents such as the ketubah (marriage contract). Some famous Jews who have used this patronymic system include the first Israeli Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion.

Names for the entire family gained popularity among Sephardic Jews in Spain, Portugal and Italy as early as the tenth or eleventh century, but did not catch on among the Ashkenazic Jews of Germany or Eastern Europe until much later.

Indian subcontinent

Patronymy is still widespread in India and Pakistan. If a father is named Khurram Suleman, he will name his son, for example, Taha Khurram, who would name his son, for example, Ismail Taha. Surnames are therefore not preserved across generations.

In southern India, in Tamil Nadu and parts of Kerala and Karnataka, patronymy is almost the norm. This is a significant departure from the rest of the country where caste or family names are mostly employed as surnames.

However, rather than using the father's full name, only the first letter—known as initials—is prefixed to the given name. For example, if a person's personal name is "Saravanan" and his father's is "Muthukumaran," then the full name is "M. Saravanan" and is rarely expanded. Some families follow the tradition of retaining the name of the hometown, the grandfather's name, or both as initials. For example, the celebrated Indian English novelist R. K. Narayan's name at birth was Rasipuram Krishnaswami Ayyar Narayanaswami, which was shortened at the behest of British writer Graham Greene.

Outsiders and fellow compatriots are frequently baffled by this unusual naming convention, as are these individuals themselves by the concept of surnames. Both the parties are often mistaken. That a personal name in south India can comprise several parts only helps add to the confusion. For example, a Tamil name such as "P. Valarmathi Josephine Cynthia" often ends up being broken down, by mistake, into three parts—first name, middle name, and last name—in northern India. A person named "R. Vetrivel" is often thought to have initialized his first name and using his surname, where in fact, it is only the given name he is using.

Nonetheless, the growing trend in cities in southern India and among expatriates is to expand the father’s name and suffix it to one’s given name, thus creating an illusory surname and preventing any possible confusion. The name stated in the earlier example, R. Vetrivel can be rewritten as Vetrivel Rajasekaran, bringing it in line with the western naming convention. This poses one awkward difficulty though. A common western practice is to refer to a person by his surname in formal contexts. This results in this individual being referred to as "Mr. Rajasekaran," which is incorrect as well as embarrassing as this actually refers to his father.

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