Where Did All the Names of People Originate?
There is no scientific plan by which people get their names. There is not much except curious interest to be gleaned from the study of how people got their names.
In the earliest days of the world, or at least as soon as men had learned to speak by sounds, all known persons, places and groups of human beings must have had names by which they could be spoken of or to, and by which they were recognized. The study of these names and of their survival in civilization enables us in certain instances to tell what tribes inhabited certain parts of the earth now peopled by descendants of an entirely different race and of another speech altogether. We learn such things from the names of mountains and other things, for instance, which still cling to them.
The story of personal names is very complex, but comes from very simple beginnings. The oldest personal names were those which indicated a group of people rather than individuals who may have been actually related to each other or even bound together for reasons of protection or other convenience. In the races of Asia, Africa, Australia and America examination shows that groups of people who considered themselves to be of the same relationship, attached to themselves the name of some animal or other object, whether animate or inanimate, from which they claimed to be descended. This animal or object was called the “totem,” and thus the earliest and most widely spread class and family names are totemistic. Such groups called themselves by names from wolves, turtles, bears, suns, moons, birds, and other objects, and these people wore badges with pictures of the animal or object from which they took their names to identify them to other people.
When, then, we come to investigate the giving of personal names among the tribes, we see that most uncivilized races gave a name to each new-born infant derived from some object or incident. So a new-born member of the “Sun” tribe would be named “Dawn,” and would be known as “Dawn” of the “Sun” tribe; or perhaps a new-born son of the tribe of “Wolf” would be called “Hungry,” and be known as “Hungry Wolf.” A member of the “Cloud” tribe would be named “Morning,” because he was born in the morning. He would always be known as “Morning Cloud.”
Later, as society became more established and paternity became recognized, we find the totem name give way to a gentile name. Among the Greeks and Romans the system was early adopted and proved satisfactory. Thus we have Caius Julius Caesar. Caius indicates that he is Roman; Julius is the gentile name given him and the Caesar a sort of hereditary nickname. On the other hand, the early Greeks began the system of introducing a local name instead of the gentile name. Thus Thucydides (obtained from the grandfather), the son of Olorus, of the Deme (township) of Halimusia.
HOW DIFFERENT NAMES ORIGINATED
This was all right and suited the purposes of the Greeks and Romans, who had plenty of time to give full explanations in this way. But in Europe, for instance, civilization demanded more speed, and the increase of population demanded more names, so that nicknames and names indicating personal descriptions and peculiarities came into use. Such names as Long, Short, Small, Brown, White, Green and others of the same kind came from this source, and as families grew these surnames stuck to the family and parents gave their children Christian names to further distinguish them as individuals. Other surnames such as Fowler, Sadler, Smith, Farmer, etc., became attached to people because of the occupations in which they were engaged, and yet other names were derived from places. The owner of an extensive estate would be designated by a Christian name which might be George (after his King) and then to indicate his landownership, von (meaning of) Wood, making the combination of George von Wood, meaning George, the owner of the place called Wood. On the other hand, he might have working for him a laborer who lived at the place and, if his name was Hiram, they would, to indicate where he belonged, put the Wood after the Hiram; but, lest there be confusion as to his class, they would put an At before the Wood and make him Hiram Atwood, indicating his Christian name, where he worked and the fact that he was not a landowner.
Many other names were invented in similar manner. When Adams became so common that there would likely be confusion on account of there being so many of them, a son of one of the Adams family would add to the name the fact that he was a son by writing his name Adamson, and thus start a new family name. Thus, in the same way also came Willson, Clarkson, and other names of that kind.
For a long time the Jews had only one word for a name, such as Isaac, Jacob, Moses, etc. They became so numerous that it was impossible to distinguish them, and so a commission was named to give surnames to all the Jews in addition to their other names. As the race was then, as now, held in derision by the rulers of many nations into which the tribe had become scattered, the people who had charge of the naming of the Jews took advantage of the opportunity to make sport of them, and gave them such names as
Rosenstock (Rose bush),
Rosenszweig (Rose twig),
Rosenbaum (Rose tree),
Blumenstock (Flower bush),
Blumenthal (Flower valley), etc., etc.
Our Christian names are from similar sources, and while many of them are well selected because of their beautiful meanings, there are many of them which mean nothing as words as they were only invented for the purpose of giving a new name to a new child.