How Hungarian surnames were formed. The meaning of the most common surnames in Russia and Ukraine

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:42

Hungarians, or Magyars, as they call themselves, are settled all over the world. In addition to their own country, entire Hungarian settlements exist in Western Ukraine (in Transcarpathia), Poland, Romania, and Slovakia. Many Hungarians moved to permanent residence overseas - to the United States and Canada. About 4 thousand inhabitants of Russia consider themselves ethnic Hungarians. Historical events mixed the Magyars with other nationalities, and often those who bear Hungarian surnames are not even aware of their relationship to this nationality.

History in the surname

Another name for this people is the Ugric. Researchers consider the eastern regions of the Urals to be the homeland of the nomadic Onougrian tribe, from where they moved to warmer places, crossed the Carpathians and found their homeland in the Middle Urals basin.

The Hungarian state was formed at the beginning of the 11th century. Representatives of other nationalities often settled on the ethnic territory of the Magyars, those who were close in religious beliefs entered into marriages and mixed with the indigenous population. Longbeing part of the Austro-Hungarian state led to the formation of Austro-Hungarian surnames.

Hungarian language and surnames: history

Despite the close environment of the language genera of the Slavic and Romano-Germanic groups, the Finno-Ugric language family stands apart. This fact explains the peculiar approach to the formation of names and surnames. Until the beginning of the 13th century, Hungarian surnames did not exist at all (this is typical of many Slavic peoples). To indicate the identity of a person, despite his class, only the name was used.

Hungarian surnames come before the given name as a qualifying adjective. The double designation of personality spread at first only among the aristocracy, among the nobles, a little later - among the townspeople. The landless poor peasants remained nameless for a long time, until in the 18th century they passed a royal law obliging everyone to have a first and last name.

Hungarian surnames: origins

Lexical groups of origin of Hungarian surnames have several sources.

The most common group consists of surnames formed from the profession, occupation, craft or position held: Molnar (miller), Ach (carpenter), Pap (priest), Kovach (blacksmith), Rakosh (direct meaning "cancer", so the fisherman was called).
Transformed father names have become just as common. This formation has also become popular for the reason that it is not customary for Hungarians to add a patronymic to a name. Father's name inAs a surname, it often has no ending: Peter Shandor and Shandor Peter are completely different people. To clarify who we are talking about, in documents, questionnaires, lists there is a column in which the mother's maiden name is indicated. Sometimes -y (and) is added to the paternal name-surname, as a sign of "whose" - Mikloshi. Another option is to add the word "son" ("phi"): Peterfi, Mantorfi.
Many Hungarian surnames are derived from the place of birth. Names of villages, towns, family castles in direct form or with the suffix –i: Kalo, Pato, Debreceny, Tordai.
A fairly large group of surnames was formed from the names of nationalities and nationalities: Tot (Serb), Gorvat (Croat), Nemeth (German), Olah (Romanian), etc.
Small, but no less common surnames among Hungarians, associated with the designation of internal or external features of a person: Nagi (big), Boldog (happy).

Female surnames

It is very unusual to change female names during marriage. Women's Hungarian surnames and given names are the full name of her husband with the addition of the ending "ny". So, the wife of Androsh Kovac will be called Androshny Kovac. To avoid confusion, a law has been passed under which modern women have the right to choose. They can add an ending to the surname (Kovachny), they can keep the maiden name and surname, they can have a double version: the maiden plus the husband. But, as statistics show, the traditions are so strong that many girls are "renamed" in the old way when they get married,which introduces certain misunderstandings among uninitiated foreigners.

Our Hungarians

Many residents of Ukraine and Russia do not consider themselves ethnic Magyars, however, they carry Hungarian surnames inherited from their ancestors. The list of the most common surnames of Hungarian origin in our country is as follows.