Jewish Family Names and Their Origins: an Etymological Dictionary

A human being's name is non like a cloak that simply hangs about him and that one may safely twitch and pull, but a perfectly fitting garment that, like the pare, envelops him so tightly one cannot scratch or scrape it without injuring the man himself.—Goethe

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An etymological written report of family names runs into much thornier territory than a survey of personal names like the 1 I undertook in these pages concluding yr ("Jewish Get-go Names Through the Ages," November 1955). Some Jewish surnames, of course, are quite easy to trace. For example, a name found among Sephardic Jews—Moshiach (Messiah)—originally signified a zealous follower of Sabbatai Zvi, the faux Messiah who very near succeeded in imposing himself on Israel in the 17th century. Similarly, Cohen and Levy are straight transliterations of Hebrew words that make it clear that the 1 is a man of priestly lineage, and the other a Jew of Levitic extraction.

But in general, surnames are infinitely more various than personal names, having been culled from more diverse sources, having undergone more than changes of form, and having come up from many more dissimilar languages. Surnames are non, in any instance, as "standardized" as first names. Nosotros experience freer to touch them upward, trim or modify them altogether. This is why the origins of many of them are lost in obscurity. Even where a name survives in its original form we may accept trouble—as with those which derive from abbreviations whose meaning was in one case clear simply which cannot now exist deciphered with certainty.

At the beginning of the Biblical period, Jews, like all members of ancient societies, had no surnames of any kind. Men were known simply every bit Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and and then forth. But as the patriarchal families swelled into tribes, more definite identifications were deemed necessary, and patronymics began to exist used: a man was designated as X ben (son of) Y. Thus we notice: Joshua ben Nun, Caleb ben Yefuneh, Palti ben Raphu, and so on. The patronymic is the form of many surnames extant today, both among Jews and non-Jews: Jameson, Johnson, Jackson, Abramson, Mendelson.

In the subsequently catamenia covered past the books of Judges and Kings nosotros detect places of origin being employed to identify individuals more closely: Doeg the Edomite, Uriah the Hittite, Elijah the Tishbite, etc., etc. At the time of the return from Babylon under Ezra we come up upon several descriptive and adjectival personal names with a definite article. These, to exist sure, occur only rarely, but they supply interesting examples of personal names that at the same fourth dimension serve very well-nigh every bit surnames: Ha-kotz (the thorn) in Ezra 2:61; Ha-katan (the little one) in Ezra viii:12; Ha-lohesh (the enchanter) in Nehemiah 3:12. This grade probably constitutes the transition to the more than definite types of surnames which make their appearance in the Talmudic menstruation.

The Biblical way of nomenclature persisted through Talmudic times, but with several innovations. Patronymics are quite prevalent in the Talmud: Jochanan ben Zakkai, Joshua ben Chananiah, Simon ben Gamliel. Merely since diverse individuals might behave the same personal and patronymic names, it was occasionally necessary to base of operations a surname on other family unit relationships. Thus we get Raba bar bar Chana (Raba the grandson of Chana), Levi the son-in-police force of Zachariah, Chama the father of Hoshaya, Tachlifa the father-in-law of Abahu, and so on.

Places of origin continued to be used every bit surnames in Talmudic times: Nahum the Mede, Nahum of Gimso, Todos of Rome, Levites of Yabne, Hillel the Babylonian, Jose the Galilean. (Judas) Iscariot and (Mary) Magdalene in the New Attestation are as well place names, the old beingness Judas ish Krioth, "the man of Krioth"; the latter, Miriam of Magdela.

It is in the Talmudic era that priestly origin first accounts for surnames: Ishmael the Loftier Priest; Jose Ha-kohen (the priest); Chanina the Principal of the Priests (due south'gan hakohanim). At least 1 surname of the same period came from position in the family: Taboth Rishba which signifies "principal of the family."

Men also earned surnames: Samuel the Astronomer; Chanina Kara (the Bible instructor); Chutzpith the Interpreter or Translator (ha-m'turgemon); Ephraim Safra (the scribe), and and so on. In the crafts we find: Jochanan the Sandal-maker; Daniel the Tailor; Ada the Waiter; Isaac the Smith. Nosotros are familiar with occupational surnames today, both amid Jews and non-Jews: thus Smith, Taylor and Schneider; Carpenter, Becker (Bakery), Shoemaker.

Nicknames besides brand their outset appearance as a source of surnames in the Talmudic period: Hillel the Old Human; Zeira the Younger; Abba Arecha (the tall one); Samuel Ha-katan (the short one); Jose Katanta (the little one). The Talmud mentions a Tayfa as well as an Isaac Sammoka (the crimson), called so considering of the color of their hair or complexions.

None of these surnames, however, had the major characteristic of modern family names: transmissibility from begetter to son. They remained attached to the individual and were not inherited past descendants. Of all ancient names, those of kings and priests approached the notion of inherited family names nearly closely. The imperial dynasty was called Beth David—the Business firm of David; the priestly course was called Beth Aaron—the House of Aaron. During the 2nd Republic, when the Davidic line had for all practical purposes disappeared politically, family unit names began to exist perpetuated amongst the priesthood, where the exercise caught on because of the various functions in the Temple that were the special province of sure priestly families. The Talmud (Tractate Yoma) mentions a priestly family, Beth Abtinas, the Firm of Abtinas, that monopolized the underground of preparing the frankincense used in the Temple; nosotros besides hear of Beth Garmo, the Business firm of Garmo, which alone possessed the hole-and-corner of baking the shewbread.

Another indication that priestly family names were transmitted is the case of the Hasmoneans, in whom the sole political leadership of Judea was vested for many generations. According to Josephus, "Hasmonean" was derived from Hasmoneus, the great-granddad of Mattathias, and was borne past all his descendants. And and then while each of the v sons of Mattathias had his own detail surname (the well-nigh famous being that of Judah which was Maccabeus), the name Hasmonean was inherited by all members of the line.

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At that place were no farther changes in the ways of selecting surnames for a long time after the devastation of the Jewish state in seventy c.east. In this respect the Jews remained uninfluenced by the Romans, who, amongst all the ancient peoples, had the most highly adult organisation of personal classification. It was only in the tenth and 11th centuries that family unit names began to go more common, among Jews and not-Jews both.

In that location are several important reasons for this development. During this period the rise of cities, to which Jews had moved in growing numbers, was the most of import immediate factor. In an urban environment it was impossible for individuals to know one another equally they did in villages, and mere personal names no longer sufficed to differentiate them equally before. The rise of commerce, too, necessitated a more verbal organization of naming. This would explain why the principal impetus for the spread of surnames came from Southern Europe, particularly Venice and the other Northward and Fundamental Italian cities that were centers of medieval commerce. Thus tradition has it that Jews first adopted surnames in Italia. One family, even so extant in the 18th century, called itself Adolescenti ("the youths") and traced its descent from the captive youths brought to Rome by Titus after the fall of Jerusalem.

The custom, moreover, of naming children after deceased relatives had become pretty well entrenched among Jews past this time, and as a outcome, many identical personal names tended to appear in the same family, which made it necessary to add something more than to a proper noun to avoid confusion.

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All through the Middle Ages surnames were quite mutual among Castilian and Portuguese Jews too, who adopted the practice from the Arabs. And 2d names soon made their appearance among the Sephardim of France, where, every bit among the other Sephardim, the patronymic type was the most popular. This was formed in various ways.

(ane) The use of ibn (son of) replaced the Hebrew ben amidst the Arabic-speaking Jews of Spain and Due north Africa. The well-nigh famous examples are Ibn Aknin, Ibn Verga, Ibn Ezra. (2) Another variant was merely to tack one's male parent's proper noun on to ane'southward own; this was particularly common in Southern France. Bonet, the son of Abraham, became Bonet Abraham; Shlomo, the son of Vidal, became Shlomo Vidal. (3) In Kingdom of spain the paternal name, translated into the vernacular, would exist used equally the family name: Chabib became Caro; Zemach became Crescas, etc., etc.

Occupations also served equally the source of family names. Amongst Spanish Jews we find Chazan (cantor), Abudraham (literally, "the male parent of the drachme"—a title designating the officeholder in charge of the mint or the collector of taxes), Atar (spice merchant), Abulafia (father of medicine), Tibbon (straw merchant). (These last 3 happen to be among the oldest and most illustrious of Sephardic surnames.) In Southern France there were Chalfan (coin-changer), Gabbai (synagogue official), Kimchi (flour merchant); and in Italy: Dayan (rabbinic guess), Rofe (doctor), Cantarini (cantor).

Many Sephardic family names stem from nicknames based on personal or other characteristics: thus Albo (white), Bueno (proficient), Kassin (Hebrew katzin—rich), Petit (small-scale), etc., etc.

Just nearly surviving Sephardic family names are derived from places of origin. This exercise became very widespread afterwards the expulsion of the Jews from Spain and Portugal, when the names of localities were preserved, it would seem, for reasons of sentiment. Spain has given us Alcalay (from Alcola), Belmonte, Cardozo, Espinoza (whence Spinoza), Gerondi, Toledano, and so on. France is the home of Nantua and Villanova, and Italy of Porto, Trani, Montefiore, and Luria (whence the present-day Lurie).

A almost interesting exercise among the Jews of medieval Espana, Italian republic, and Southern France—particularly among those who were writers—was to form a surname by translating the proper noun of one's identify of origin into Hebrew. Thus Parchi comes from perach, Hebrew for "flower," and was adopted by a Jewish writer from Florenza in Spain; Yarchi comes from yareach, the Hebrew for "moon," and was used past a Jew of Lunel in France; Kaspi was taken from kesef, Hebrew for "silvery," by a Jew of Argentière. Other surnames designated the quarter of the metropolis in which the bearer lived: hence Portaleone, or "Panthera leo's gate," a section in the Roman ghetto.

A proper name might indicate both the occupation and place of origin of its bearer: Rofa di Porto—the doctor of Porto, Italia—was the honored leader of his community. His descendants grow today under a corrupted class of that same proper name: Rappaport!

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Among the Ashkenazim in Northern Europe the story is quite dissimilar. They were more isolated from the Gentiles effectually them than were the Sephardim in the Mediterranean countries; their political rights were more precarious; and last but not least, they were non numerous in the larger cities. In Frankfort on the Main the Jews numbered only seven hundred in the 14th century, and there were only about twelve hundred Jews in Prague as late equally the 16th. Members of communities of this size usually knew one some other quite intimately, so there was fiddling need for surnames. In official registers, the surname "the Jew" was generally added to the commencement name, and that was all. In the Jewish records themselves we notice as names, also the common patronymic forms, a prevalence of places of origin: Ephraim of Bonn, Meir of Ruthenberg, Yom Tob of York, Petachiah of Regensberg, Yechiel of Paris, and and then on.

In the 14th and 15th centuries, nosotros come up across some family unit names that already wear their modern forms—that is, the designating preposition is omitted: thus Moysse Tannenbach, and Gabriel Treviess, both of which second names are based on places of origin. In patronymics we find a Jeckli the son of Jolieb referred to as Jeckli Joliebes.

Though the development of surnames amidst the Ashkenazi Jews followed patterns similar to those of their Gentile neighbors, there was i basic divergence: the Crusades and the subsequent ascent of commerce may take provided the impetus for an increase of family names amid Christians, simply the progress of the Crusaders themselves through French republic, Germany, and Bohemia brought great suffering and political deposition to the Jewish communities there. And with the deterioration of their political and social status, the spread of family names among the Jews was arrested—equally if such names, or the need for them, were a concomitant of material and social advancement. And the increasing isolation of the Jews of Western and Central Europe, in the belatedly Centre Ages and during the Reformation, from the centers of life around them seems to accept connected to keep their need for distinctive names low.

Jewish birth records were not kept in about places during the Middle Ages. Even where they were, the fortunes of the community were usually such that they were either lost or destroyed. Inscriptions on tombstones provided a more permanent record, and these evidence us that family names were rather exceptional among Ashkenazi Jews before the late 18th century: that is, equally long as they were left free to cull them of their own accord. The few choices they did make, even so, ready a number of precedents that were followed later on, when they were compelled by constabulary to adopt 2d names.

One of the about important developments in the history of Jewish family names took place in Frankfort on the Main, where the Jews were compelled to live in a special section called the Judengasse, and families were registered according to the houses they occupied, the right to live in that location being closely tied up with the ownership of one'due south firm.

In medieval High german cities, as elsewhere in Europe, houses were not numbered; few people then could read messages or numbers anyway. Information technology was therefore the custom in most places to identify a firm by a sign hung outside. These colorful and picturesque business firm signs seem to have had a detail attraction for Jews; no matter how far the Jew had traveled from his original house in Frankfort, he nonetheless valued its memory. So strong, in fact, was the honey of the Jews for their house signs that they became part of family tradition and, like their forefathers in the days of the Roman Caesars who put signs in the catacombs, the Jews of Frankfort and Prague carved house signs on their gravestones.

The rationalizing French introduced the practice of numbering houses, and by the end of the 18th century firm signs had all only disappeared in Germany. When, in 1776, the houses in Frankfort's Judengasse were ordered to exist numbered, there was such bitter resistance that the city council fined the whole Jewish community. This is all the more meaning because at that place is no testify of any Gentile community shedding tears at the passing of its firm signs. (Mayhap no other people in pre-19th-century Europe were so conservative fundamentally every bit the Jews, who tended to brand habitual usage sacred usage.) Information technology is therefore pocket-size wonder that so many house signs institute their manner into Jewish family names from the 16th century on.

At beginning, house signs were illustrations of the owner's proper noun. Thus the house of a Jew known every bit Wolf would be called "zum Wolf,"—"at Wolf'due south," and its sign would bear a motion picture of a wolf and the house itself be designated "At the Sign of the Wolf." To this day European hotels, inns, and pubs use such signs, and they were also mutual in Colonial America. Many German language Jewish get-go names which had been taken from animals lent themselves very well to pictorial representation, so nosotros observe homes with such designations as: "At the Sign of the Gans (goose)"; "At the Sign of the Baer (bear)"; "At the Sign of the Loeb (king of beasts)." All these animal names, it must be remembered, were first names.

Sometimes a slight modification had to be made in guild to correspond the business firm owner's proper noun by a picture. The atomic of Isaac was ordinarily "Seckl." If a business firm-owner was named Isaac, he would have a sickle painted on his firm sign, feeling that Sickel—the German for "sickle"—could hands correspond "Seckl." In the same way the figure of a blackbird (Amsel) adorned the houses of Jews called Amschel—which is a corrupted form of Anselm.

Merely not all personal names could exist represented by pictures. In such cases Jews often borrowed from the house signs of Gentile neighbors. These borrowings likewise were somewhen incorporated into family names and are all the same extant: thus Strauss (either ostrich or flower bouquet), Taube (dove), Apfel (apple), Birnbaum (pear tree), Gruenbaum (greenish tree), Nussbaum (nut tree), Rothschild (red firm-shield), Stern (star), Engel (affections), and so on.

One family in Frankfort that was of priestly descent and known as Cahn took for its house sign the picture of a boat (Kahn is the German for "boat"). Subsequently, other members of the same family used the sign of a send—Schiff—and then that what was originally the Hebrew Kahn became the German language Schiff.

Those who bear the family name Elefant or Elfand (Slavic: Gelfand) will exist interested to observe that business firm signs have been found showing that what our forefathers called "elephant" was represented by the picture of a camel!

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Throughout the Middle Ages, equally nosotros have seen, the Jews relied greatly on patronymics for family names. The name of the scholar Moses Isserles is an example: Isserles is a genitive class of Isserl, which was used as a diminutive of Israel. Other names of the same kind are Fishels, Moscheles, Sanders.

Since women were often the breadwinners, many famous Ashkenazim bore as surnames the names of their mothers or other female members of their family: Samuel Eidels, Joel Sirkes (Sirke being a diminutive of Sarah), Moshe Rivkes, Elijah Pessels, Zvi Chayes, etc., etc. Names denoting personal characteristics announced now and so: Klein (small), Lang (long), Jaffe (cute), Schwartz (dark or black), and and so forth.

Some Jewish last names throw lite on historical facts of great involvement. For example, the common notion that medieval Jews were exclusively engaged in coin-lending tin can be refuted by the fact that surnames such as Arzt (doctor), Becker (baker), Metzger (butcher), Schreiner (cabinet-maker), and Schneider (tailor) survive from earlier the 15th century. Other occupations appear equally family names either in German or Hebrew: Apotheker and Rokeach (druggist), Schreiber and Sofer (secretary or letter-writer), Richter and Dayan (rabbinic approximate), Lehrer and Melamed (teacher).

However, almost Jewish surnames in the Middle Ages derive from places of origin, with every part of Europe existence represented, often in corrupted course. Alsatian Jews coming to Federal republic of germany were dubbed Welsch or der Welsche meaning "foreign." When these Jews, driven by persecution, migrated to Poland, Welsch became Wallack, Wallach, or Wloch, which, when their bearers remigrated to Federal republic of germany, became Block.

Jewish final names formed from abbreviations—a practice never followed by Gentiles—were derived from the initials of a first name and patronymic as well as from places of origin. Such names were usually conferred on great masters of learning: thus Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Itzchaki), Rambam (Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon), Ralbag (Rabbi Levi ben Gerson), and Rashal (Rabbi Shlomo Luria). Amongst the curious abbreviations derived from places of origin is Ash from Altshule, the erstwhile synagogue of Prague, or from Aisenshtadt. Other abbreviations commemorate a special effect in the life of the family unit: Bak, from B'ne K'doshim, "children of martyrs"; Sak from Sera K'doshim Spiro, "descendants of the martyrs of Speyer."

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Before leaving the Heart Ages, several observations ought to be made. In our twenty-four hours, the last proper noun is more important than the first: Doe distinguishes John Doe from most of the rest of the world, and John only distinguishes him from other Does. In the Middle Ages, however, the surname served simply to help along the personal proper name in its identifying office: Doe distinguished John Doe from all the other Johns. The primacy of the medieval beginning proper noun can be discerned in the fact that the monogram of Albrecht Dürer, the famous German painter of the 16th century, consisted of a capital "A" and a small "D." Similarly in the works of the paiytanim (the composers of Hebrew liturgic poetry), who sometimes signed their poems by forming an anagram of their names from the initial letter of each line, it is the first name that is honored in the corking majority of cases.

Some other sign of the slight regard medieval Jews had for their family names was the ease with which they themselves, or other people, changed them. A name denoting a place of origin might be altered only because its bearer had moved. Joel Herlingen (Herlingen was the residence of his father) was also called Joel Stein (Stein beingness his ain place of residence).

But the diverse surnames attached to i and the same Jew can also be attributed to the addiction of using both a religious and a secular first proper name. The same was true of surnames: a Jew sometimes had one proper noun in the Jewish community and another for borough and business purposes. Simon Heine, the great grandfather of Heinrich Heine, was also called Simon Bueckeburg, having come up from that identify. The philosopher Moses Mendelssohn was sometimes called Moses Dessauer because he came from Dessauer.

A classic example of multiple naming is Moses Schuster Kahn, who was also known as Moses Spanier Kahn and Moses Frosch Spanier. Schuster is an occupational surname, denoting that he was a cobbler by trade; the name Kahn tells united states of america that be was of priestly lineage; Spanier identifies him every bit having originally come from Spain; Frosch is from a firm sign, indicating that either Moses or his forefathers once lived in a business firm marked "At the Sign of the Frog."

This disorganized state of affairs as regards Jewish family names created great difficulties for government authorities, and so, when the German language states undertook to "emancipate" the Jews at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, they made an attempt to regularize Jewish family unit names by requiring them to adopt fixed and permanent ones. (At the aforementioned time use of the Hebrew language in their business concern transactions was prohibited.)

In 1797 Emperor Joseph II promulgated an edict ordering the Jews of Galicia and Bucovina to assume permanent family unit names. Similar edicts were passed in Frankfort in 1807 and in Baden in 1809. And Napoleon's proclamations of Jewish emancipation in France, Hesse, and Westphalia in 1808 were accompanied past laws requiring the adoption of permanent family names. Prussia followed suit in 1812, Bavaria in 1813, and Saxony in 1834. In 1845 the Jews of the Russian empire were as well compelled to take fixed family names.

These new regulations were intended, above all, to serve several practical ends for the governments concerned. The levying of taxes would be expedited by fixed surnames, and then would the conscription of Jewish soldiers. But here was likewise an opportunity to Westernize, "civilize," and digest the Jew. To many an "enlightened" Jew himself, the adoption of a family unit proper noun looked to be one more asset in the struggle to secure equal rights and integrate oneself in the Gentile world.

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Most Jews, even so, resisted the adoption of fixed family unit names—again, out of an ingrained conservatism. In many places, the edicts had to be enforced over and over again. Meanwhile, for the government officials in accuse, the granting and registering of names proved a new way of extorting money from Jews. Fine-sounding names came at a high price, while those who could not beget to pay were stuck with names like Salz (salt), Schmalz (grease), Nierenstein (kidney stone), and Garfinkel (carbuncle). Just as the utilize of Hebrew in business transactions was prohibited, and then an attempt was fabricated to eliminate all Hebrew elements from names and render their class as "High german" every bit possible. This led to the prohibition of Biblical names, but the prohibition was not strictly enforced, and Jews managed in many cases to evade it.

Where Jews could manage past some device or other to escape the interference of the government and choose their own names, they resorted to several methods. When the deadline finally came, many who had delayed opened the Bible at random and chose the first name they could find. We know of one congregation that assembled in the synagogue at the management of its rabbi, who and then opened the prayer volume and assigned the offset word on the page to the start family, the post-obit give-and-take to the 2nd family, and and so on down the line. In some cases names were simply invented out of whole textile; in others they were taken from characters in the pop literature of the twenty-four hour period (Sternberg, Morgenthau).

But a more popular procedure still was to draw on the tribal lineage of the family. Those who were descended from the priestly caste (kohanim) became Cohen, Kahn, and Katz (the latter an abbreviation for kohen tzedek, "priest of righteousness")—or, in Slavic countries, where there was no "h" sound, Kogen, Kagan, and Kaplan (the terminal meaning "descended from priests"). Those of Levitic descent became Levy, Levin, Levinsky, Levitan, Levitt, Levitansky, and Segal (the latter an abbreviation for due south'gan leviah: "fellow member of the Levites"). Some of the authorities, however, frowned upon these Hebraisms and insisted that Germanic forms be used. Hence we go a baroque assortment of Hebrew-High german combinations: Aronstein, Katzmann, Levinthal, and so along.

Some other method was to make the secular first name or kinnuy, which could easily exist adapted to the vernacular, into the family name. Sometimes a corrupted or diminutive course of the Hebrew or Yiddish first name would do for a surname: e.g. Baruch Bendit, Jacob Koppelman. Oft the Hebrew first proper noun was simply translated into the vernacular: thus Solomon Friedman.

Such translations were made in every language. For example, Wolf, the kinnuy of Benjamin, appeared as the Slavic Wilk. In the same mode Naphtali, for which the kinnuy Herz (hart) was used as a family proper noun, was translated past French Jews into Cerf, while in Slavic countries it became Yellin or Yellinik. (Herz, incidentally, is the root of several names—Herzbach, Herzbrunn, Herzfeld, Herzberg.) The suffixes were added either for the sheer sake of embellishment or to distinguish one name clearly from another.

The simplest style of choosing a family proper name was to create a patronym. Among Austrian and German Jews this was done with the suffix –sohn, and amid Slavic Jews with the suffix –vitch: hence Mendelsohn, Mendelovitch; Abramsohn, Abramovitch; Isaacsohn, Isaakovitch. Jews in Slavic countries too used the suffixes -ov, -off, -eff, and -kin to denote "descendant of," and to this day we find a host of matronymics and patronymics built on this principle: Baskin, Barkin, Chaikin, Rivkin, Sorkin, Malkov, Aronoff.

In Germany and the Austro-Hungarian empire, the female parent's proper name rather than the father'due south very often served every bit the basis of a surname: Sarassohn, Zirelsohn, Breines, Beiles, Gitles, Reines, Zeldes, Perles. And frequently a man would abdicate both his parents to become with his wife: Dienesmann (hubby of Dinah), Estermann (husband of Esther), Hodesmann (married man of Hadassah), Perlmann (hubby of Perl). Sometimes, however, it was possible to make a German language-sounding proper name out of the initials of the Hebrew patronymic, so that many a ben Baruch became Bab, while ben Chaim could emerge as Bach, and ben Rab Nathan as Brann.

Occupations, of class, became an important source of derivation amongst the Ashkenazim when it came to the germination of new surnames: Becker (bakery), Fleischer (butcher), Breuer (brewer), Weber (weaver), Farber (painter), Goldschmidt (goldsmith), Kramer (merchant), Wechsler (moneychanger), Ackermann (farmer), Brenner (distiller), Gerber (tanner). Hundreds of other examples could exist cited, and when nosotros consider that the same principle was followed past Jews living in many different linguistic communication areas, nosotros get some thought of the vast number of occupational names.

This category, incidentally, is fifty-fifty wider than might be suspected at kickoff, for occupational names were now and then taken from the material worked with or from the tools of the trade. Thus a tanner might call himself Leder (leather), and a tailor would become Seidenfaden (silk thread), Fingerhut (thimble), Nadel (needle), or Scher (shears). A carpenter might choose to be a Nagel (smash); a cook, Ribeisen (grater); or a maid, Biegeleisen (flat-iron).

All occupations, professions, and crafts, from the most homely to the most exalted, are represented among Jewish family unit names. There are, for instance, a whole range of names deriving from religious occupations: thus Rabad (an abbreviation of resh av beth din, head of a rabbinic court) and the Slavic Ravidovitch; Babad (ben av beth din, son of a rabbi), and Rabinovitch, Schulman, and Shkolnick. The cantorate provided Kantor, Vocalizer, Schatz (abbreviation for shliach tzibbur, "representative of the congregation") and Schen (abridgement of shliach ne-emon, "faithful representative"). From the profession of ritual slaughterer came Shechter, Shochet, Bodek (inspector of animals), Resnick (Slavic for shochet), and Shub (abbreviation for shochet u-bodek—slaughterer and inspector).

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Personality and physical characteristics, as nosotros accept seen, had ever been a source of breezy Jewish surnames (and of non-Jewish as well: Richard the Lion-Hearted, Charles the Wise, Frederick Barbarossa—i.due east., of the crimson beard). It was to be expected, therefore, that many Jews would adopt surnames of this type when the new laws came into outcome. Names similar Kurtz (short), Stark (strong), Schnell (fast), Gross (big) are mutual examples. We as well notice a large group of names determined by the color of 1's hair: Schwartz (Slavic: Chorney) for black, Weiss (Slavic: Bialik) for white, Roth (red), Braun (brownish), Gelber or Geller (yellow), Kraushaar (curly hair), Graubart (gray bristles).

Some Jews simply registered the nicknames past which they were known in the Jewish customs with the local authorities. Sometimes, however, it took a full purse to persuade the civil magistrate to agree; costless names similar Ehrlich (honest), Kluger (wise), or Frohlich and Lustig (happy) came at a high price. One grouping of family names was supplied by the days of the week as well as by seasons—Frühling (spring), Sommer (summer), Sonntag (Sunday), Dienstag (Tuesday)—referring presumably to the time of nascency or, perhaps, to the occasion on which the name was officially registered.

Nonetheless, most Ashkenazi family unit names, like those of the Sephardim, point to places of origin, and so we find innumerable provinces, cities, villages, and hamlets all over Frg, Austria, Poland, western Russia, Hungary, and other countries represented among extant Jewish surnames.

Some of the nigh pop place names are: Auerbach, Bachrach, Bamberger, Bernstein, Brody, Dreyfuss (Alsatian corruption of Trier or Troyes), Dresner (Dresden), Epstein, Florsheim, Ginzberg, Wiener, Weil, Landau, Spiro (Spayer from Speyer, whence also Shapiro), Lemberger, Lasker, Kalischer, Ellbogen, Horowitz (Slavic: Gurovitz), Gumbiner, Schwab, Schlesinger, Frank, Posner, Pollack, Litauer, and and so on.

Several interesting historical details are involved in Jewish place names. Nürnberg, for example, is seldom plant every bit a Jewish proper name, while Fürth, a suburb of Nürnberg, is quite common, every bit is the variant Further. Having been expelled from Nürnberg in 1499, Jews were permitted to spend only the day in that urban center if they had business there; at dusk they had to return to Fürth.

It isn't always easy to make up one's mind offhand whether a particular proper noun stems from a town or not. Thus Steinberg and Goldberg happen to exist names of real places, merely Levinstein and Aronthal are inventions. Nor demand the possession of a place name mean that the bearer actually was a resident of the identify designated. Many Jews called Moses selected the place proper noun Mosbach because of its phonetic rather than geographic connection.

Adler (hawkeye), Blum (flower), Buxbaum (box tree), Fisch, Hecht (throughway), and Karp are all firm-sign names. In that location is a particularly interesting history behind the proper noun Adler. The legendary phoenix, which was said to exist reborn out of its ain ashes, was identified, on the basis of Psalms 103:5, with the eagle as the symbol of Jewish survival, and this made it popular as a firm sign and then every bit a surname. House signs also are behind the prevalence of fish in Jewish family names: i.e. Lachs (salmon), Hecht (motorway), Carp or Carpeles. But the fish tin exist traced to other seas also. Jewish inhabitants of the city of Ryback (pregnant "place of fishes") called themselves by the names of actual fish! Many whose first name was Ephraim used the kinnuy Fischel as a family proper noun considering in the Bible Jacob told Ephraim that his seed would multiply as the fish in the body of water (Genesis 48:16). But some Ephraims fancifully substituted the names of specific fish. There were Jonahs who adopted names of fish considering of the story of the whale, and at that place were Joshuas who did likewise because the Biblical Joshua was the son of Nun (www existence the Hebrew for fish).

Just the many Jewish surnames taken from flowers, plants, and gems cannot exist attributed to house signs alone. They were pop because they were considered beautiful, and for names so considered the officials in charge of registration exacted the highest prices. The start Mandelbaums, Rosenbaums, Weinstocks, Perlmutters, Diamonds, and Rubinsteins paid a good penny for their fancy names.

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A Great number of the names discussed so far are preserved amid American Jews, either in their original forms, or in versions slightly altered by immigration officials who could not spell or pronounce them properly. Other changesⁱ have come up about as a consequence of the general tendency to Americanize—or rather, Anglicize—the course and spelling of foreign-sounding surnames amidst Jews and Gentiles akin. A common procedure has been to translate the European word into English (and so that Goldschmidt becomes Goldsmith; Schoenkind, Fairchild, and so on), or simply to shorten the name: Fleischhacker to Fleisher, Mandelstamm to Mandel, Freidenthal to Fried.

Ofttimes the European element is completely expunged, with a purely American course emerging: Steinschneider becomes Stone; Finkelstein, Finch; Moskowitz, Moss; Kalisch, Cole. In about cases, the initial letter of the alphabet of the old proper noun is retained as the footing of the new i.

But information technology is in Israel rather than America that Jewish surnames have undergone a total revolution of late. Israelis have been Hebraizing their names at a feverish charge per unit, as though the taking on of a new name in a new land were of itself an act of spiritual rebirth.

In a series of manufactures appearing in the Hebrew monthly Bitzaron, Dr. Mordecai Kosover pointed out that the practice of Hebraizing surnames began sporadically among the early halutzim. It was in this early period that Eliezer Perlman, the great lexicographer, became Ben Yehudah, while David Green of Poland became David Ben Gurion of Palestine, and Isaac Shimshelevitz reappeared equally Isaac Ben Zvi, afterward to be elected president of Israel.

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Afterward a slow start, name-changing was stepped up considerably under the British Mandate as a event of pressure from Zionist leaders who wished to give Palestine a "Hebrew appearance." Another factor was the adoption of undercover names by members of the Haganah; with the achievement of independence these names were retained—merely as the cover names assumed by Bolsheviks and other revolutionaries in Czarist Russia somewhen became public and permanent. Even while the Arab-Israeli state of war was withal on, a pamphlet was circulated amid members of the Israeli armed forces calling upon them to discard their strange names and choose Hebrew ones. After the war, Moshe Shertok became Sharett; Berlin was changed to Bar-Ilan; Elath was derived from Epstein, Agron from Agronsky, Granot from Granovsky, and Eshkol from Shkolnick.

The establishment of the state gave a tremendous impetus to the Hebraizing process, and in the first year of independence, seventeen thousand men and women changed their original names for Hebrew ones. The rush was and so great that the Department of Immigration had to establish a special role for the purpose of speeding upwards the legal mechanism of name-changing.

Names continue to exist changed in Israel today, both amidst quondam settlers and new arrivals, and the government nevertheless publishes special lists every week to announce the changes that have been registered.

Some Israelis, particularly those with some first-hand feel of the European holocaust, have resisted the trend to rid all names of Diasporic influence, feeling that perpetuation of the old names is a fashion of keeping the memory of a cherished past alive. Simply they are in a small minority, and the Hebraizing process goes on apace, encouraged by a government which feels that the sooner every Israeli has a Hebrew name the more quickly volition cultural and national homogeneity be achieved. No direct legislative pressure is beingness applied, but writers satirize Diaspora names and people ridicule them in chat. They are held to smack also much of the humiliations of a by that many Israelis are only too eager to forget. The result is a psychological climate that works for the complete eradication of "Jewish" 2d names.²

The sources for the new Hebrew names, both personal and surnames, are the Bible, the Talmud, and Midrashic literature. Those individuals who cannot find names on their ain come up for help to the Board of Names, which is part of the Board of Language. Near of the new names are short, of one or ii syllables, and most are Hebrew, though some Aramaic forms take been used.

Dr. Kosover has made a written report of some four thousand Israeli family names involving almost twenty thousand persons, and has found several definite patterns in the way in which they have been Hebraized. Occasionally an effort is made to preserve some phonetic element of the quondam proper name: thus Orenstein becomes Oren; Lubarsky, Bar; Goldenberg, Golon; Greenblatt, Goren; Dorfman, Doron; Osovsky, Asaf; Zokovsky, Zakai. The aforementioned purpose is achieved in other cases by transposition—Biber emerges as Rabib and Brodner gets transformed into Bendor—or by the substitution of Hebrew suffixes for Slavic and Germanic ones, Aronowitch becoming Aroni, and Wolfsohn, Z'evi.

Foreign patronymics are frequently replaced with Semitic forms by using the Hebrew ben, the Arabic ibn, or the Aramaic bar: thus ben Zvi, ibn Zahav, bar Droma. The Hebrew prefixes avi- (father of) and achi-(brother of) have come into widespread employ, as has the suffix -el (Avidor, Achiasaf, Gadiel). Just the most popular method has been to translate either the whole or part of the old name into Hebrew: Birnbaum thereby becomes Agosi (Birn and agos both mean "pear"); Nussbaum, Agozi (Nuss and agoz both mean "nut"); and Rosenbaum, Vardi (Rosen and vard both mean "rose").

Fisher and Riback similarly become Dayag (which is Hebrew for "fisher"); Kovalsky and Kuznitsky become Naphcha (the Aramic for "smith"); Novick becomes Chodosh (new); Wexler becomes Chalfan (money-changer); Jung becomes Elem (young); Recht becomes Amiti (honest); Lempert becomes Lavi (leopard); Adler becomes Nesher (eagle); Silver becomes Kaspi (silvery); Schild is changed to Mogen (shield).

In that location is a certain poetic justice in the attempts some Israelis accept made to rectify the wrongs done more a century ago to their forefathers by Austrian and German officials: Inkdiger (hinkediger pregnant "lame") has been changed to Adir (strong); Alter (one-time) becomes Abrech (young); Ungluck (misfortune) has been transformed to Osher (fortune), and Lugner (liar) to Amiti (human of truth).

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Names expressing the emotions and sentiments of the new era that has begun with the country accept also been pop choices. These names are congenital on roots like dror and cheruth (both meaning freedom), am (people), and tzur (rock). Among the results are: Drori, Lidror, Cheruthi, Amichai, Amikom, Elitzur. Some other kind of expressive proper name harks dorsum to the disaster in Europe which preceded the nativity of Israel: Nanod (wanderer), Sordid (refugee), Galmud (solitary).

Most 65 per cent of the surnames received originally past German Jews are of geographic origin, and roughly the same proportion holds for East European Jews. In Israel too, place names are common, but these have nothing to do with their bearers' places of origin. For instance, the name Ophir does non mean that its bearer, or an ancestor of his, comes from the southwest of the Arabian peninsula where Solomon got his gold; what has happened is that people once called Goldberg, Goldman, or Zolotovsky take taken the proper noun of Ophir simply because of its association with the idea of aureate.

Not all changes of name in Israel are from non-Hebrew into Hebrew forms. Some Israelis who had Hebrew names in the first identify have causeless new ones; some non-Hebrew names have been changed to new non-Hebrew ones. And at that place are even some cases of Hebrew names condign not-Hebrew ones in Israel.

One gets the feeling that the process going on in Israel is an attempt to correct a wrong washed to Jews in Eastern and Fundamental Europe over a century ago. The new family names in State of israel may still not fit perfectly, merely they have at least helped wipe out some of the painful associations. Artificial though information technology appears, the manner of naming in Israel may serve as new skin to embrace the blemishes and heal the scars of years gone by.

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¹See J. Alvin Kugelmass'southward "Name-Changing—and What It Gets You lot" in Commentary for August 1952.—Ed.

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²Even Golda Meyerson had to become "Meir" when she was recently appointed Foreign Minister of Israel.

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Source: https://www.commentary.org/articles/benzion-kaganoff/jewish-surnames-through-the-agesan-etymological-history/

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