While compiling a list of resources pertaining to obsolete occupations back in January, it reminded me about surname origins when I read so many occupations that are also modern day surnames.

I also realized that I’ve never published a post about how our surnames came to be, so here is a short introduction to surname origins.

Surnames weren’t commonly in use in the Middle Ages and some areas didn’t mandate the use of a single surname per family until the 1600s.

However, surnames derived from four categories of descriptors:

Patronymics – When too many people in a village had the same given names, they were identified as related to their parents, e.g. John Stevenson was the son of Steven, Michael Johnson was the son of John, etc.

This was a convenient way of identifying people, but it produced a system whereby surnames might change with every generation if the son was named for the father.

For example, let’s say that Anders Peterson had three sons – Anders, Johan and Peter. His grandchildren would be named Anderson (son of Anders), Johanson (son of Johan) and Peterson (son of Peter.)

In Scandinavia, some form of daughter was also in use – e.g. Margaret Andersdatter, Susannah Johnsdatter and Maria Petersdatter.

By the 1800s, the various -datter endings became obsolete with the -son ending applying to all children in the family.

Location – This is a pretty straightforward category. People of the same name were identified based on the place where they lived – Mary Hill, John Rivers, Samuel Ashwood (lived near the ash trees) and Simon Lake.

Physical Characteristics – This is also a simple category to understand. People were named after a physical characteristic that they displayed. Stephen Short was a man who wasn’t very tall, Matthew Armstrong had strong arms, and Stufflebean is a variation of Stoppelbein, which meant stubble leg. The name is first found in the Palatinate in the early 1600s. My family assumes that the first of the surname perhaps lost a leg in an accident.

Occupation – This is the category that linked my thoughts from obsolete occupations to surname origins. Most occupational surnames are fairly common names – Miller, Smith (e.g. blacksmith), Cooper, and Baker.

There are also surnames deriving from clan affiliations, nicknames and, today, there are some surnames that have been created by a family. I personally worked with a teacher whose surname was unique because the family made it up!