Surnames in other languages

[just1203]

The history of the surname is a little more complicated than 'Smith'. During the ancient feudal time, kings will often force people that belong to a rival family to change their last name as a form of submission.

That happened in 1232. After usurping the Ly Dynasty, the Tran’s clan leader Tran Thu Do forced the descendants of the Ly family to change their last name to Nguyen.
Same thing happened in 1592, after losing their dynasty, most of the Mac family changed their last name to either Nguyen or Leu to avoid retribution from the new king.
Then in 1802, the Nguyen family took over the throne, so a lot of people changed their last name to Nguyen in hope of earning favors from the royal family.
The Nguyen themselves bred a lot. Gia Long, the first Nguyen emperor famously had more than 100 concubines. Minh Mạng, the second emperor, had 142 official children.
The Nguyen was also the last feudal dynasty in Vietnam, so there was no new kings to force the same fate onto them.

[Lydart]

In western Kenya, the Joluo people have a system where the persons middle name indicates the time of day they were born, or some other noteable event.  Names beginning with an 'A' are feminine, those beginning with 'O' are male. 

For example, a great friend of mine was Joseph Adhiambo Suku.  Wait a bit, you may say ... he has a female middle name !   True, but he was born at the same time as his mothers sister died, so he was given her name, Adhiambo.   (Suku was his fathers name.)

My children were all given Luo names .... so as two of my daughters were born in the evening, they are both Atieno; third daughter was born in the afternoon, so she is Adhiambo; and my son, the last born, is Otieno (same as the girls - born in the evening), but he has the additional name of Obon'go .... a boy born after girls.

It can get a lot more complicated than the above ..... but the local people are used to it !!

And NO surnames as in Europe.

[DavidG02]

Also, a branch of my family goes by the name of Vanstone.
The Canadian side have changed this to Van Stone and have assumed the name comes from Belgium or The Netherlands
Nope! Stems from North Devon and Cornwall

Amanda Vanstone was a Federal politician here in Australia

[brigidmac]

Thanks for posting this..I'm having a job identifying Lithuanian Latvian
Ancestors they seem to alter spellings everytimr they emigrate and have documents in Russian Hebrew Polish and English

The Goldberg's may have been Golden Gold or Goldstein

Friedman also Freed and Freedman within one generation between 1850+1930

[pinefamily]

Also, a branch of my family goes by the name of Vanstone.
The Canadian side have changed this to Van Stone and have assumed the name comes from Belgium or The Netherlands
Nope! Stems from North Devon and Cornwall

Amanda Vanstone was a Federal politician here in Australia

And her sister is still a judge here in SA, I believe. Supreme Court?

[Chilternbirder]

Thanks for posting this..I'm having a job identifying Lithuanian Latvian
Ancestors they seem to alter spellings everytimr they emigrate and have documents in Russian Hebrew Polish and English

The Goldberg's may have been Golden Gold or Goldstein

Friedman also Freed and Freedman within one generation between 1850+1930

Transliteration through other scripts can always create anomalies. When I worked in a bank I once interviewed a prospective customer who was a Palestinian from Israel. She produced ID documents that bore very little relation to the name as she wrote it in an Anglicised form as they had been transliterated from the Arabic version into Hebrew then back to Latin script.

[Rosinish]

A bit late but hopefully helpful;

"Faragher" comes from an Old Irish personal name, Fearchar"

In Scotland Farquhar, I believe pronounced as 'Feracher'...certainly to my ear 

Annie

[brigidmac]

I wonder if Landsman could have become Landau Landis and or Lane in other countries .

Making names shorter could also be due to  translation simplifications

[Mart 'n' Al]

The Indian name 'Patel' is sometimes westernised to 'Farmer'.

Wikipedia:

The term patel derives from the word Patidar, literally "one who holds (owned) pieces of land called patis", implying a higher economic status than that of the landless.

Martin