When did last names start being used, and who introduced the concept?

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There is a substantial amount of information on Wikipedia, with legendary use of family names going back to 5,000 years (plus or minus) and documented use going back at least 3,600 years. There is also information on that page around the derivation of English family names from occupations, personal characteristics, etc.

Predating the use of family names are patronyms. These are used in Iceland (amongst other societies) today.

Upvote:0

I have always assumed that it was just a matter of numbers.

In a small village, there would only be one Bill, Joe, Jim. Bob.

If there were several, you distinguished them in obvious way : by profession, distinguishing (physical) characteristic, place of origin, or parent (etc, etc).

Margret Thatcher, Jack London, Harald Bluetooth, Snorri Sturluson, Scipio Africanus (double hit there).

That's the origin. When they began to stick, though ... I don't know

Upvote:1

As others already had pointed out, having only one name is usually not enough to distinguish people. So you have to add something, a, second given name, religious (saint) name, a patronymic, family name, geographic feature, occupation, age (junior, elder, the second etc) and so on.

In some cultures (e. g. Jewish) there is a tradition to give the kids the name of their grandfather.

That said, the proto-indo-europeans had a tradition to give kids only one name, but a compound word, often composed of the father and mother parts. Thus the names were composed of two roots, like Cleopatra, Argipedes or Bratislava. Sometimas the combinations were meaningful, sometimes meaningless (historical Cleopatra had a family name Philopator, so she was Cleopatra Philopator).

Upvote:1

James C. Scott points out in "Seeing like a State" that the modern form of last names came about to meet the needs of tax collectors and conscription officers: If a carpenter in small town in Palestine is called "Yeshua ben Yosef", everyone in town will know who is meant because there are only so many Yeshuas around. This only works as long as you stay in one village or its surrounding. Note that the very common naming pattern "ben Yosef", "Josefsson" etc. identifies someone in relation to their nearest kin and only works within one generation.

The conscription agent (whom did not exist in this form in Roman Palestine) then has a problem to match the different Yeashuas ben Yosefs on his list with actual people. So modern states needed their subjects to have more identifiable names.

You asked when this happened (examples from the book):

  • Qin dynasty China:4th century BC
  • 1427, the Catasto of the Florentine city state
  • 1381, the Wat Tyler rebellion arose, according to Scott, as areaction to registrations and poll taxes
  • There's also an in-depthj example from colonial rule over the Phillipines in tht 19th century

In all these examples, the rich families would have permanent surnames before these registrations, common people would not

Upvote:4

In Europe last name was an attribute of noble origin. It could be either personal "award", or name of noble progenitor. Ordinary people didn't have last name at all (only first name and father's name).

That means that last names existed nearly always, but only few had them.

As to when last names became common, it depends upon country. As far as I remember, say, Icelanders still don't have "last names". Anyway, "common last names" seem to be a relatively "new addition" for Europe.

And, yes, those "Smiths" and "Millers" got their last names because of job, but in many cases etimology is uncertain. Say, Russian scientist Mikhail Lomonosov's last name certainly means "break nose". But no one knows whether some of his fathers was such a bully, or that was due to Russian vernacular name of Clematis, or something else. There is no easy answer here.

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