Polish names

A Polish personal name, like names in most European cultures, consists of two main elements: imię, or the given name, followed by nazwisko, or the family name. The usage of personal names in Poland is generally governed (in addition to personal taste or family custom) by three major factors: civil law, Church law, and tradition.

Imię (given name)

A child in Poland is usually given one or two names; Polish registry offices do not register more than two. Among Catholics, who form the vast majority of the population, it is customary to adopt the name of a saint as an informal third given name at confirmation, however, this does not have any legal effect. (This is reminiscent of the pre-Christian rite of the "first haircut" (postrzyżyny), which also involved giving the child a new name).

Parents normally choose a name or names for their child from a long list of traditional names which may be:

• a Christian name, i.e., a Biblical name or a saint's name, or
• a Slavic name of pre-Christian origin.
• a name with a meaning that can be traced to, somehow, Poland.

Note that names of Slavic saints, such as Wojciech (St Adalbert), Stanisław (St Stanislaus), or Kazimierz (St Casimir), belong to both groups. Additionally, a few names of Lithuanian origin, such as Olgierd (Algirdas), Witold (Vytautas) or Danuta are also quite popular in Poland.

Traditionally, the names are given at a child's baptism. Non-Christian but traditional Slavic names are usually accepted, but the priest may encourage the parents to pick at least one Christian name. In the past two Christian names were given to a child so that he or she had two patron saints instead of just one. At confirmation people usually adopt yet another (second or third) Christian name; however, it is never used outside Church documents.

In Eastern Poland, as in many other Catholic countries, people celebrate name days (imieniny) on the day of their patron saint. On the other hand, in Western Poland birthdays are more popular. Today, in Eastern Poland birthdays remain relatively intimate celebrations, as often only relatives and close friends know a person's date of birth. Name days, on the other hand, are often celebrated together with co-workers, etc. Information about whose name day it is, can be found in most Polish calendars, web portals, etc.

It is required by law for a given name to clearly indicate the person's sex. Almost all Polish female names end in the vowel -a, while most male names end in a consonant or a vowel other than a. There are, however, a few male names, such as Barnaba and Bonawentura, which end in -a. Maria is an exceptional name as it is a female but can sometimes be used as a male second name (never a first name).

The choice of a given name is largely influenced by fashion. Many parents may name their child after a national hero or heroine, some otherwise famous person, or a character from a book, film, or TV show. In spite of this, a great number of names used in today's Poland have been in use since the Middle Ages.

Diminutives are very popular in everyday usage, and are by no means reserved for children. The Polish language allows for a great deal of creativity in this field. Most diminutives are formed by adding a suffix. For male names it may be -ek or the more affectionate -uś; for female names it may be -ka, or -nia / -dzia / -sia / cia respectively. Maria, a name whose standard form was once reserved to refer to Virgin Mary has a particularly great number of possible diminutives, which include: Marysia, Maryśka, Marysieńka, Marychna, Mania, Mańka, Maniusia, Maja, Majka, Marusia, Maryla, Maryna, Marianna, Mariola, Marzena, Marlena; Marietta, Marita, Marika, Marisa. Some of those (underlined) have eventually become treated as standard names of their own (probably having their own derivatives), others are shared diminutives (italics), written after semicolon are less popular (considered as foreign).Also, another example can be Anastazja: Tusia, Nastusia,Aniusia, Ania, Anielka, Asia or Stacia.

Also, as in many other cultures, a person may informally use a nickname (przezwisko, ksywa) in addition to or instead of a given name.

As of 2004, the most popular female names in Poland are Anna, Maria, and Katarzyna (Catherine). The most popular male names are Piotr (Peter), Jan (John), and Andrzej (Andrew).

Nazwisko (surname)

Polish surnames, like those in most of Europe, are hereditary and generally patrilineal, i.e., passed from the father on to his children.

A Polish marriage certificate lists three fields, the surnames for the husband, wife, and children. The partners may choose to retain their surnames, or both adopt the surname before marriage of either partner, or a combination of both; the children must receive either the joint surname or the surname of one of the partners, if they are different. However, a married woman usually adopts her husband's name and the children usually bear the surname of the father. The wife may keep her maiden name (nazwisko panieńskie) or add her husband's surname to hers, thus creating a double-barrelled name (nazwisko złożone). However, if she already has a double-barrelled name, she must leave one of the parts out — it is illegal to use a triple- or more-barrelled name. It is also possible, though rare, for the husband to adopt his wife's surname or to add his wife's surname to his family name.

A person may also legally change his or her surname if:

• it is offensive or funny;
• it is of foreign origin;
• it is identical to a given name;
• that person has effectively used a different surname for a long time.

The most widespread Polish surnames are Nowak, Kowalski, and Wiśniewski.

History

Family names first appeared in Poland ca. 15th century and were only used by the nobility (szlachta). Originally the nobles belonged to chivalric clans whose names survived in the names of their coats of arms. Eventually, members of one clan would split into separate families with different surnames, usually derived from the name of the village they owned. Sometimes the family name and the clan name (associated with the arms) would be used together and form a double-barrelled name.

The most striking peculiarity of the Polish heraldic system is that a coat of arms does not belong to a single family. A number of families sharing male-line origin or sometimes even unrelated by blood but only by a formal adoption upon ennoblement (sometimes hundreds of them), usually with a number of different family names, may use a coat of arms, and each coat of arms has its own name, usually the name of the original blood-line the clan descends from. The total number of coats of arms in this system was relatively low — ca. 200 in the late Middle Ages.

One side-effect of this unique arrangement was that it became customary to refer to noblemen by both their family name and their coat of arms/clan name. For example: Jan Zamoyski herbu Jelita means Jan Zamoyski of clan Jelita (though it is often quite incorrectly translated as ...of the clan Jelita coat-of-arms as if he was not a blood-member of the line).

From the 15th to 17th centuries, the formula seems to copy the ancient Roman naming convention with the classic tria nomina used by the Patricians: praenomen (or given name), nomen gentile (or gens/Clan name) and cognomen (surname), following the Renaissance fashion, thus: Jan Jelita Zamoyski, forming a double-barrelled name (nazwisko złożone). Later, the double-barrelled name would be joined with a hyphen: Jan Jelita-Zamoyski.

The use of family names gradually spread to other social groups: the townsfolk by the end of the 17th century, then the peasantry, and finally the Jews. The process finally ended only in the mid-19th century.

After the First and Second World Wars some resistance fighters added their wartime noms de guerre to their original family names. This was yet another reason for creating double-barrelled names. Examples include Edward Rydz-Śmigły, Jan Nowak-Jeziorański, and Tadeusz Bór-Komorowski. Some artists, such as Tadeusz Boy-Żeleński, also added their noms de plume to their surnames. Surnames of commonplace

Noga Wisniewski Kimovski Wlosinski Radon

Polonia

When Poles emigrate to countries with different languages and cultures, the often-difficult spelling and pronunciation of Polish names commonly cause them to be misspelled or changed; sometimes indirectly by transliteration into, e.g., Cyrillic.

For example, in German, ski and cki are often replaced by sky and tzky, sz by sch, and so on; English often changes w to v and sz to sh. Similar changes sometimes occur in French, as well as the addition to aristocratic names of de (la particule[1]) or von in German. However, it is not very correct as the ski/cki/dzki surnames already contain the de/von meaning.

Changes in Spanish may be even more extreme. A Spiczyński may become simply Spika, for example. Hyphenated double-barrelled names are often rearranged: Erasmus Bogorya-Skotnicki becomes Erasmo Bogorya de Skotnicki or Erasmo Skotnicki de Bogorya.

Classification

Based on grammatical features, Polish surnames may be divided into:

• nominal, derived from and declined as a noun
• adjectival, derived from and declined as an adjective.

Adjectival names very often end in the suffixes -ski, -cki and -dzki (feminine -ska, -cka and -dzka), and are considered to be either typically Polish or typical for the Polish nobility. However, this is not exactly true, exactly as in France or Germany where not all people with a de or von in their names were formally nobles: the adjectival suffix -ski, -skii or -sky is found in many other Slavic languages, and in Poland, the adjectival form of a name was not reserved to the szlachta.

Based on origin, Polish family names may be generally divided into three groups: cognominal, toponymic and patronymic.

Cognominal

A cognominal surname (nazwisko przezwiskowe) derives from a person's nickname, usually based on his occupation, or a physical or character trait.

Examples:

• Kowal, Kowalski, Kowalczyk, Kowalewski — from kowal, or "blacksmith"; or from Kowale or Kowalewo ("Smithville") in case of Kowalski and Kowalewski.
• Młynarz, Młynarski, Młynarczyk — from młynarz, or "miller"; or from Młynary ("Millersville") in case of Młynarski.
• Nowak, Nowakowski, Nowicki — from nowy, or "new one"; or from Nowakowo or Nowice ("Newmantown") in case of Nowakowski and Nowicki.
• Lis, Lisiewicz, Lisowski — from lis, or "fox"; or from Lisowo ("Foxville") in case of Lisowski.
• Kołodziej, Kołodziejska, Kołodziejski - from koło, or Wheel, Maker, Wheelwrightor; or from Kołowice ("Wheeltown").

Toponymic

A toponymic surname (nazwisko odmiejscowe) usually derives from the name of a village or town, or the name of a topographic feature. These names are almost always of the adjectival form.

Examples:

• Brodowski — lord of Brodowo;
• Tarnowski — lord of Tarnów;
• Zaleski — lord of Zalesie;

Patronymic

A patronymic surname (nazwisko odimienne) derives from a given name of a person and usually ends in a suffix suggesting a family relation.

Examples:

• Jan, Jachowicz, Janicki, Jankowski, Janowski — derived from Jan (John or Ian), Jankowo or Janowo (Johnstown).
• Adamczewski, Adamczyk, Adamowski, Adamski — derived from Adam; or from Adamczewo / Adamowo (Adamsville).
• Łukasiński, Łukaszewicz — derived from Łukasz (Luke); or from Łukasin (Luketown).

Other

There is also a class of surnames derived from the past tense of verbs. These names usually have the feminine (-ła) or neuter (-ło) past tense ending, e.g. Domagała, Przybyła, Napierała, Dopierała, Szukała or Podsiadło, Wcisło, Wlazło, Przybyło. A smaller number of surnames use the masculine form, e.g. Musiał. Note that in foreign countries, where the letter Ł is not available, l will be used instead, e.g. Domagala.

Feminine forms

Adjectival surnames, like all Polish adjectives, have masculine and feminine forms. If a masculine surname ends in -i or -y, its feminine equivalent ends in -a. Surnames ending with consonants have no specific feminine form. Examples:

Masculine	Feminine
Malinowski	Malinowska
Zawadzki	Zawadzka
Podgórny	Podgórna
Biały	Biała

Nominal surnames may or may not change with gender. Like other Slavic languages, Polish has special feminine suffixes which were added to a woman's surname. A woman who was never married used her father's surname with the suffix -ówna or -'anka. A married woman or a widow used her husband's surname with the suffix -owa or -'ina / -'yna (the apostrophe means that the last consonant in the base form of the surname is softened). Although these suffixes are still used by some people, mostly elderly and in rural areas, they are now becoming outdated and there is a tendency to use the same form of a nominal surname for both a man and a woman.

Father / husband	Unmarried woman	Married woman or widow
ending in a consonant (except g)	-ówna	-owa
ending in a vowel or in -g	-'anka	-'ina or -'yna

Examples:

Father / husband	Unmarried woman	Married woman or widow
Nowak	Nowakówna	Nowakowa
Madej	Madejówna	Madejowa
Konopka	Konopczanka	Konopczyna
Zaręba	Zarębianka	Zarębina
Pług	Płużanka	Płużyna

Formal and informal use

Poles pay great attention to the correct way of referring to or addressing other people depending on the level of social distance, familiarity and politeness. The differences between formal and informal language include:

• using surnames vs. given names;
• using vs. not using honorific titles such as Pan / Pani / Państwo;
• using the third person singular forms vs. second person singular.

Formal language

Pan / Pani / Państwo

Pan and Pani are the basic honorific styles used in Polish to refer to a man or woman, respectively. In the past, these styles were reserved to hereditary nobles and played more or less the same roles as "Lord" or "Sir" and "Lady" or "Madame" in English. Since the 19th century, they have come to be used in all strata of society and may be considered equivalent to the English "Mr." and "Ms." while the nobles would be addressed "Jego/Jej Miłość Pan/Pani" (His/Her Grace Lord/Lady). There used to be a separate style, Panna ("Miss"), applied to an unmarried woman, but this is outdated and replaced by Pani.

"Państwo" is widely used when referred to a married couple (instead of using separately Pan and Pani) or even the whole family.

Examples:

• Pan Kowalski + Pani Kowalska = Państwo Kowalscy
• Pan Nowak + Pani Nowak = Państwo Nowakowie

Titles

Scientific and other titles are used always together with "Pan" and "Pani".

Examples:

• Pan profesor Jan Nowak
• Pani doktor Maria Kowalska

During a conversation with another person often the names are dropped and only the first two words are used like "Panie Profesorze" or "Pani Doktor".

Given name / surname order

The given name(s) normally comes before the surname. However, in a list of people sorted alphabetically by surname, the surname usually comes first. Hence some people may also use this order in spoken language (e.g. introducing themselves as Kowalski Jan instead of Jan Kowalski), but this is generally considered incorrect or a throwback to the Communist era during which it was a common form of address. In many formal situations the given name is omitted altogether.

Examples:

• Pan Włodzimierz Malinowski
• Pani Jadwiga Kwiatkowska

Informal language

Informal forms of address are normally used only by relatives, close friends and co-workers. In such situations diminutives are generally preferred to the standard forms of given names. At an intermediate level of familiarity (e.g. among co-workers) a diminutive given name may be preceded by formal Pan or Pani.

Examples:

• Pan Włodek (but also standard form "Pan Włodzimierz")
• Pani Jadzia (but also "Pani Jadwiga")

Using the honorific style only with a surname is sometimes perceived as rude if used to refer to a given person directly (e.g. "Panie Kowalski"). In such a case it is more polite to avoid this form and when referring to the person use just the form "Pan", without given or family name.

It is very rude not to refer to someone unknown with "Pan" or "Pani". The act of changing from this form to a friendly "you" must be acknowledged by both parties and it is a mark of a close friendly relationship between the two people. Only the older or more respected person can propose this, as otherwise it can be perceived as very arrogant.

There is a clear distinction between the "friends" and "colleagues". For example, co-workers will be very rarely referred to as friends - most likely only after the titling was mutually agreed to be changed from "Pan/Pani" to "you".

See also

• Name of Poland
• Polish clans
• Polish heraldry
• T-V distinction
• Family name
• Family name affixes

External links

• Database of Polish given names Template:Pl icon
• Most common surnames in Poland Template:Pl icon