![]() ![]() This form probably constitutes the transition to the more definite types of surnames which make their appearance in the Talmudic period. These, to be sure, occur only rarely, but they supply interesting examples of personal names that at the same time serve very nearly as surnames: Ha-kotz (the thorn) in Ezra 2:61 Ha-katan (the little one) in Ezra 8:12 Ha-lohesh (the enchanter) in Nehemiah 3:12. At the time of the return from Babylon under Ezra we come upon several descriptive and adjectival personal names with a definite article. In the later period covered by the books of Judges and Kings we find places of origin being employed to identify individuals more closely: Doeg the Edomite, Uriah the Hittite, Elijah the Tishbite, etc., etc. The patronymic is the form of many surnames extant today, both among Jews and non-Jews: Jameson, Johnson, Jackson, Abramson, Mendelson. Thus we find: Joshua ben Nun, Caleb ben Yefuneh, Palti ben Raphu, and so on. But as the patriarchal families swelled into tribes, more definite identifications were deemed necessary, and patronymics began to be used: a man was designated as X ben (son of) Y. Men were known simply as Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and so forth. Even where a name survives in its original form we may have trouble-as with those which derive from abbreviations whose meaning was once clear but which cannot now be deciphered with certainty.Īt the beginning of the Biblical period, Jews, like all members of ancient societies, had no surnames of any kind. This is why the origins of many of them are lost in obscurity. ![]() We feel freer to touch them up, trim or change them altogether. ![]() Surnames are not, in any case, as “standardized” as first names. Similarly, Cohen and Levy are direct transliterations of Hebrew words that make it clear that the one is a man of priestly lineage, and the other a Jew of Levitic extraction.īut in general, surnames are infinitely more various than personal names, having been culled from more diverse sources, having undergone more changes of form, and having come from many more different languages. For example, a name found among Sephardic Jews-Moshiach (Messiah)-originally signified a zealous follower of Sabbatai Zvi, the false Messiah who very nearly succeeded in imposing himself on Israel in the 17th century. Some Jewish surnames, of course, are quite easy to trace. A man’s name is not like a cloak that merely hangs about him and that one may safely twitch and pull, but a perfectly fitting garment that, like the skin, envelops him so tightly one cannot scratch or scrape it without injuring the man himself.-GoetheĪn etymological study of family names runs into much thornier territory than a survey of personal names like the one I undertook in these pages last year (“Jewish First Names Through the Ages,” November 1955). ![]()
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