Greek surnames are widely spread over the world. Here an example of the geographical distribution of one of the most frequent Greek surnames: Papadópoulos. The fact that you find many persons with this surname in Australia has to do with many Greek people emigrating to Australia over the past decades, more people than actualy emigrated to the US or to other European countries.
Statistics for : PAPADOPOULOS fasle fasle true
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| PAPADOPOULOS | EUROPEAN_OTHER WESTERN | GREEK | GREEK |
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| The roots of a name are derived from Onomapwhich is a research methodology that classifies names into groups of common cultural ethnic and linguistic origins. For more information about Onomap, see the FAQ. |
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| Top Cities |
| STUTTGART , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
| MÜNCHEN , BAYERN , GERMANY |
| ESSLINGEN , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
| SCHWAIKHEIM , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
| LONDON N1 , SOUTH EAST , UNITED KINGDOM |
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Another Greek surname is Papandréou, probably best known from the former Prime Minister of Greece, George Papandreou. This name is a former gentive form expressed by the ending -ou and marked the belonging to someone in the sense 'son/daughter of ...'. The base of the surnames ending in -ou was usually the father's first name. These kind of surnames are called patronyms.
Statistics for : PAPANDREOU fasle fasle true
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| PAPANDREOU | EUROPEAN_OTHER WESTERN | GREEK | GREEK |
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| The roots of a name are derived from Onomapwhich is a research methodology that classifies names into groups of common cultural ethnic and linguistic origins. For more information about Onomap, see the FAQ. |
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| Top Cities |
| NÜRNBERG , BAYERN , GERMANY |
| WORCESTER , WEST MIDLANDS , UNITED KINGDOM |
| PINNER , SOUTH EAST , UNITED KINGDOM |
| WEIL IM SCHÖNBUCH , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
| WICKFORD , SOUTH EAST , UNITED KINGDOM |
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Another nice example for Greek surnames is Kontós, which means 'short'. It usually referred to the heighth of the person, i.e. a short man or woman. There are many surnames charaterizing people, not only in Greek but also in German (e.g., Kurz(e) which means exactly the same as the Greek example) and many other languages. Greek Kontós can also be a shortened form of names like Kontogiánnis that exhibit the meaning of 'short' (here meaning 'short John'). The distribution of the name shows again, that many Greeks once emigrated to Australia but also to the US.
Statistics for : KONTOS fasle fasle true
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| KONTOS | EUROPEAN_OTHER WESTERN | GREEK | GREEK |
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| The roots of a name are derived from Onomapwhich is a research methodology that classifies names into groups of common cultural ethnic and linguistic origins. For more information about Onomap, see the FAQ. |
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| Top Cities |
| CADAQUES , CATALUÑA , SPAIN |
| HERRENBERG , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
| CHICAGO , ILLINOIS , UNITED STATES |
| ENFIELD , SOUTH EAST , UNITED KINGDOM |
| MÜNCHEN , BAYERN , GERMANY |
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The surname Kolokotrónis is probably best known from the Greek general and leader of the Greek Independence War Theodoros Kolokotronis (Greek: Θεόδωρος Κολοκοτρώνης) (3rd April 1770 – 4th February 1843). Interestingsly, most Greek emigrants exhibiting this surname can be found in Sweden.
Statistics for : KOLOKOTRONIS fasle fasle true
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| KOLOKOTRONIS | EUROPEAN_OTHER WESTERN | GREEK | GREEK |
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| The roots of a name are derived from Onomapwhich is a research methodology that classifies names into groups of common cultural ethnic and linguistic origins. For more information about Onomap, see the FAQ. |
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| Top Cities |
| KARLSRUHE , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
| STUTTGART , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
| DURMERSHEIM , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
| MYSEN , ØSTFOLD , NORWAY |
| REICHERTSHOFEN , BAYERN , GERMANY |
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Source: http://worldnames.publicprofiler.org/Default.aspx
The following map shows the worldwide distribution of the Greek family name Tsípras, probably best known from the current leader of the SYRIZA party in Greece. As you can see, people exhibiting this surname outside of Greece are mostly found in the US. For the moment, I haven't found any information about the etymology of this name (any suggestions, comments etc. are always welcome!) but I will update this part as soon as possible.
Statistics for : TSIPRAS fasle fasle true
| Roots of this name: |
Sorry we don't have any information on the roots of this name.
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| The roots of a name are derived from Onomapwhich is a research methodology that classifies names into groups of common cultural ethnic and linguistic origins. For more information about Onomap, see the FAQ. |
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| Top Cities |
| NORRISTOWN , PENNSYLVANIA , UNITED STATES |
| WUPPERTAL , NORDRHEIN-WESTFALEN , GERMANY |
| SOUTHGATE , MICHIGAN , UNITED STATES |
| SPOKANE , WASHINGTON , UNITED STATES |
| MANCHESTER , NEW HAMPSHIRE , UNITED STATES |
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Source: http://worldnames.publicprofiler.org/Default.aspx
The following map shows the worldwide distribution of the Greek family name Samarás, which is probably best known from the current leader of the NEA DHMOKRATIA party in Greece. As you can see, people exhibiting this surname outside of Greece are mostly found in Australia and then in the US. This distribution isn't astonishing because many Greeks emigrated to Australia (especially to Melbourne) in the past decades. For the moment, I cannot provide any information about the etymology of this name (any suggestions, comments etc. are always welcome!) but I will update this part as soon as possible.
Statistics for : SAMARAS fasle fasle true
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| SAMARAS | EUROPEAN_OTHER WESTERN | GREEK | GREEK |
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| The roots of a name are derived from Onomapwhich is a research methodology that classifies names into groups of common cultural ethnic and linguistic origins. For more information about Onomap, see the FAQ. |
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| Top Cities |
| STUTTGART , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
| MANNHEIM , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
| LUDWIGSHAFEN , RHEINLAND-PFALZ , GERMANY |
| MÜNCHEN , BAYERN , GERMANY |
| KÜNZELSAU , BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG , GERMANY |
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Source: http://worldnames.publicprofiler.org/Default.aspx
The surname I've chosen today is: Tsaoúsoglou. It is a Greek name exhibiting the Turkish suffix -oglou which means 'son of'. As such it marks belonging to a person (usually the father), in our case 'son of Tsaousis'. Greek surnames with this Turkish suffix are mostly found in Northern Greece, especially the places near Turkey. As you all may know, there were many Greeks living in West Turkey before emigrating to Greece and bringing their "turkished" surnames with them. Suffixes meaning 'son of' are found in many other languages, e.g., in German and other Gmc. languages (marked by the suffix -(s)sen or -(s)son). Interestingly, the surname Tsaoúsoglou is mostly found in France (and of course in Greece).
Statistics for : TSAOUSOGLOU fasle fasle true
| Roots of this name: |
Sorry we don't have any information on the roots of this name.
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| The roots of a name are derived from Onomapwhich is a research methodology that classifies names into groups of common cultural ethnic and linguistic origins. For more information about Onomap, see the FAQ. |
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Source: http://worldnames.publicprofiler.org/Default.aspx
Today I would like to present some of the typical Greek surname endings/suffixes, instead of exemplifying the geographical distribution of single names.
Surnames did not exist in Ancient Greece. They started beeing introduced during the Byzantine Empire (especially since the 10th century onwards).
Many Greek surnames are patronyms, i.e., they refer to one's father and were usually inflected in the Genitive, compare, e.g., Ioánnis tou Nikoláou 'John (Sohn) of Nikolaus' which later became the surname Nikoláou. The ending -ou is the gen. suffix. There are many different suffixes of this kind, e.g.,
-ádis / -ídis
-ákis (almost 90% of all Cretes have a name with this suffix)
-ákos
-ántis
-átos
-éas
-é(l)lis
-ítsis
-óglou (s. Tsaoúsoglou above)
-ópoulos (s. Papadópoulos above)
-oúdis
-oúlis
Compared to this big amount of patronyms, metronyms are relatively seldom.
I will continue with this survey very soon. Please be patient.
Here an interesting short inside into Greek personal names.
And here another interesting inside into Greek surnames, which also offers an etymology for some surnames here.
You want to know more about your surname? Send a request!
Whats the meaning and history behind Tsaousis?
ReplyDelete