Where do your first name and surname come from? Six facts that surprise

You get your first name from your parents and your surname from your ancestors. You carry both every day and rarely think about them. Yet each one has a history behind it: family choices, Church rules, the law and journeys across the ocean. Here are six facts that show a name is more than a signature.

1. Old Slavic names were wishes

Before Christianity reached the Polish lands, Slavs had names of their own. The most characteristic had two parts, like Bogusław, Jarosław or Mieczysław. The linguist Michał Mordań of the University of Białystok writes that they were wishes: they carried a good omen or the parents' blessing for the child's future.

So in naming a child, parents spoke a hope for who the child would become. We choose names for other reasons today, but every parent knows that feeling.

2. Saints saved Stanisław and Wojciech

Around the turn of the 16th century, Christian names almost entirely replaced native ones. Mordań gives two reasons: the growing cult of the saints and, above all, Church rules that allowed only names from the liturgical calendar at baptism. In the Western Church this followed from the decisions of the Council of Trent.

A few Slavic names survived, mostly those borne by saints. In Poland these included Stanisław, Wojciech, Kazimierz and Wacław. If you bear one of them, your name goes back to the time before Christianity and was saved by a patron saint.

3. The law says what you may name a child

Today parents choose names, but within the law. Poland's 2014 Civil Registration Act allows no more than two first names for a child. A name may not be registered as a diminutive or be mocking or indecent. It may be foreign, whatever the parents' citizenship or nationality. It may also not show the child's sex, as long as in common use it belongs to one sex.

If parents choose a name that breaks these rules, the head of the civil registry office refuses it and chooses a name for the child by an administrative decision.

4. A surname that makes people laugh can be changed

Many Polish surnames grew out of nicknames and ordinary words, so some sound funny or unkind today. Poland's 2008 Act on Changing First Names and Surnames allows a change for important reasons. The first one it lists is a first name or surname that is mocking or not in keeping with human dignity. Another is a change to a name someone actually uses.

Most people keep the surname of their ancestors anyway, even an unusual one. It ties them to their family and its history.

5. Nowak is Poland's most common surname

In 2021 the Ministry of Digital Affairs, which publishes the surname lists from the PESEL register, put out a notice with a telling title: "Nothing new – Nowak first again" ("Nic nowego – Nowak znowu pierwszy"). To see how many people bear your surname and how rare it is today, look it up on Name Atlas.

6. Nobody changed names at Ellis Island

Many emigrant families tell the story: great-grandfather arrived in America, and an official at Ellis Island wrote his name down his own way. The US Citizenship and Immigration Services explains that this is a myth. Passenger lists were not made at Ellis Island but abroad, usually close to the emigrant's home, when the ticket was bought. The inspector on the island had the finished list in front of him and was not allowed to change a name unless the immigrant asked or the details proved wrong.

Names changed later and gradually: at school, at work, in offices where English speakers wrote them down. That is why, when you look for ancestors across the ocean, it pays to check different spellings. Our guide to finding your ancestors shows how.

Your name has a history too

Every surname came from something once: a father's name, a place, a trade or a nickname. What the endings -ski, -wicz and -ak say is in our piece on surname endings. And to see how many people bear your surname today and where they live, look it up on Name Atlas.