Talk:Lists of most common surnames in European countries

Erased some BS

i erased this BS, because every spanier has at least 3 names: Name, father's family name and mother's family name: José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero has 4 names: a double name and the family names.

«It is common for people having one of the more common surnames to use a second surname (usually their mother's maiden name, but sometimes the second surname carries across generations) so that their name stands out (e.g. José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, Benito Pérez Galdós).»

i must have already met millions of spanish names. and mine is also spanish so i know wtf ima talking bout. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 147.142.8.29 (talk) 14:08, 23 May 2010 (UTC)

Smith in Scotland

At present, the top of the list is

===Scotland===

Smith (1.28) from: [[wride (surname)|Smith]] (1.28)

Brown (0.94)

so Smith is in red letters and it directs to ‘Wride’. That's odd. 129.69.141.80 (talk) 11:47, 21 June 2011 (UTC) (Not Spanish. Spanier means "man from Spain" in German ...)

Switzerland

Somebody messed up this section. It looks Italian to me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.109.40.250 (talk) 20:09, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

That's because it deals only with the Ticino canton, where the language is Italian.Redactor33 (talk) 07:01, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

The names are correct for Italian-speaking Switzerland - Bernasconi, for instance, is a very typical name there. But I'm surprised to find no list for French-speaking Switzerland, which is a more populous area of the country and has plenty of typical local names - some of them ending in -az, -oz or -ez (like names in the adjoining parts of France) and some borrowed from the German-speaking part of the country. To be really complete it would be good to include names from the Romanche-speaking part of Switzerland, which are again quite distinct (e.g. Cavegn, Decurtins). And perhaps the order of the language groups should be changed to reflect their relative populations: first German, then French, then Italian and finally Romanche. You wouldn't expect to find Italian Switzerland listed first.83.163.73.142 (talk) 11:40, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

Portugal

the section concerning portuguese surnames is just terribly poor. It looks like that list was made a) in the 15th century b) by somebody who didn't know the portuguese language. I might change it some other day — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.84.77.114 (talk) 17:20, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Also, what is the frequency in 1000?

Canary islands?

What are the Canary Islands making in this page? Canary Islands are in Africa, not Europe. --95.120.69.107 (talk) 21:01, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

The Canary Islands are part of a European state, Spain. Jotamar (talk) 23:51, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

Refrence link problem

the link for ref. #12 (danish names) isn't correct, but I couldn't find how to fix it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Alenros (talk • contribs) 12:08, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Slovakia

Just compare the most common surnames in Hungary and Slovakia. It’s not the effect of magyarization, it’s simply the truth; majority of most common „Slovak” surnames are Hungarian. What is the meaning of Varga, Nagy, Tóth, Szabó, Molnár and Balog in Slovak?--Rovibroni (talk) 18:50, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

I agree the ones that are marked as Hungarian should be noted, or even more emphasized, but what you did was blatant pro-Hungarian bias. You removed the references to the Germanic and Latin origins and replaced everything with "Hungarian", which was clearly incorrect. I wholesale undid your revision and each name should be re-evaluated for its Magyarization level individually. JesseRafe (talk) 20:25, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Just see the spelling and the meaning. Ethnic Slovaks hardly ever bore Hungarian names. In the 18th century some group of Slovaks moved to the Hungarian Great Plain and they kept Slovak names. Surname magyarization was very rarely among Slovaks (least of all in the present-territory of Slovakia), local Slovak priests used Slovak names, so the "magyarization" argument is simply slanted in this case. Tóth is of old Germanic origin (Tod), but in the Pannonian Basin just ethnic Hungarians bear this name (meaning Slavic or Slovak in old Hungarian, "tót" is still a word for Slovaks in Hungarian), as well Varga, Nagy, Szabó, Molnár and Balog. Every names has meaning in Hungarian, but in Slovak none. These names are simply ethnic Hungarian names, so "Ugric" (Hungarians separated from Ugric realtives 3000 years ago, Hungarians doesn't understand any other Ugric language) and other funny notes and explanations are simply untrue.--Rovibroni (talk) 21:16, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm not disputing the historic migrations of people. Also, you seem to misunderstand typology. It says Ugric instead of Hungarian for the same reason it says Slavic, Germanic, or Indo-European rather than language names, but the name of the family. Go for it case-by-case if you want, but what you did was remove more information than you added. I see that English is not your native language, but the note paragraph was previously very well-written and it was replaced with new prose written by you that did not have even simple verb agreements. Making such huge sweeping changes and deleting previous scholarly editions with things poorly written is what prompted me to do a complete undo, maybe adding some simple notes about which names are Hungarian is better than your edit of naming every single name in the list as Hungarian and removing other references. Also rehashing the exact same top ten list in the chart is redundant and poor writing stylistically. JesseRafe (talk) 21:24, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Hungary

Recent edits have been making clear revisionist history claims that every name in Hungary has a Hungarian origin. There's no question that they are in use in Hungarian language, but names from the bible or names adopted from Germanic or Slavic neighbors are prima facie NOT Hungarian in origin. Insisting on it is reminiscent of Nineteen Eighty-Four newspeak. The only source used for "all names are Magyar" is in Magyar, not English. Some of the names on the list are attested to in Slavic and Germanic writings (either by them or by the Romans or Greeks) centuries before the Magyars came into Europe. Arguing that Serbs and Germans got the name from Hungarians is absurd. JesseRafe (talk) 19:27, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

I don't claim that every surnames in Hungary have Hungarian origin, i claim that all of the most common 200 names of Hungary (exluding Novák) have meaning in old or modern Hungarian. That's a fact and it is well-sourced, studies by Tamás Farkas (Hungarian Academy of Sciences, both of them are in Hungarian and English too, just see). These sources stated that all of the top 200 are modern Hungarian-language names (excluding Novák), not of Hungarian origin. There are "meaning" and "language" (previously origin) in the table and language is for modern meaning, not origin. 20% of Hungarian words have Slavic, 11% Germanic, 9.5% Turkic and 6% Latin and Greek roots, but these words are Hungarian today (we adopted Slavic and Turkic words before the conquest of the Pannonian Basin, more that 1100 years ago) so i marked the original language in the brackets. Origin is unambiguous and not well-sourced. Please do not undo the sourced version.--Rovibroni (talk) 20:49, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

1. Actually you did. It's been changed to reflect their actual origins.
2. It's not a fact and it's not science. They're in use in modern, contemporary Hungarian, but not Hungarian. "Christopher" is an English version of a Greek name. "Eduardo" is a Spanish version of an English name. I don't understand how you don't get this distinction.
3. Saying that they're words or used in Hungarian and ignoring their origins is boring and of no scholarly use or interest. If you want the column to just say "Everything is Hungarian" then the column should be deleted. There's no such column for Japanese or Thai names, because all Japanese/Thai names are in those languages, so it's not interesting.
4. You persist in claiming that "ultimate origins" are unverifiable. There is a science called historical linguistics, the name origins I changed the languages to are factual. You then asked for citations, did you read my edit summary? The previous one was "Olah - see Walhaz for etymology, Racz - see Raška (region)" The first is a whole article about the Proto-Indo-European to Proto-Germanic to ancient attested uses to modern usage of "Walhaz" and all its derivatives, including Olah in Hungarian and even other non-IE languages like Estonian. It's a simple fact.
5. I see in your edit history that you also have a habit of deleting sources or altering articles to make things more "Pro-Hungary". This was the same conflict we had previously with Slovakia. It's pretty transparent that you tend to make biased nationalistic edits. Or that you want to stress Hungarianism beyond its original bounds into every possible facet and ignore the contributions made to society, culture, names or anything else made by neighbors or citizens of a Slavic or German background.
6. The fact that you still persist in calling "Simon" a Hungarian name which even the layperson knows can't possibly be true is enough evidence how far you are biased. JesseRafe (talk) 21:10, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Stop reverting the page until it's resolved on the Talk Page. Also, your "source" is not in both Hungarian and English, only Hungarian. There's an abstract at the end in English that reads like opinion and has no data. There's a chart in Hungarian that I'm guessing lists other "Non-Hungarian" names (according to this guy) which also lists their ranking, meaning Novak isn't the only one in the top 200. Radics, Kollar, Schmidt, etc are listed there as well. We need credible, readable, sources. This would be a fine source for the Hungarian article. But as it stands now, the version with the actual language of origin is significantly more informative than your biased "Everything is Hungarian and Hungarian is everything" approach. JesseRafe (talk) 21:22, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Ok. Your overdone personal remarks are appalling, do as you like.

What is the source for Molnár's Slovak origin? Molnár was first mentioned in 1330 and that time there was no uniform Slovak language, only several West-Slavic (Slovak) dialects. Other statements also needed sources (edit summary and highlighted words are not reliable sources).--Rovibroni (talk) 21:47, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

I didn't have a source, but I clicked the link and the page right there said it was a Hungarian name borrowed from Slovak. I'd have no problem changing it back to "West Slavic" rather than "Slovak". Also, "first mentioned in 1330"? That's a pretty gutsy statement from someone accusing others of not having sources. Where did all those years come from? Molnár took me to Mlynář which is the Czech variant. I skipped the German Muller/Mueller/Miller etc because while the word meant the same it's not a case of a borrowing with those languages. Mlynář had not much info on it so I went back to the Molnár page and read it in all its other languages. Sure there are Hungarian people listed, as well as Australian people (clearly immigrants so I'm not going to claim it is thus an English name) there are not insignificant number of Slovaks, Croats, and Czechs listed as famous bearers. Plus, some Germans, Danes, and French. The Slovak page lists mostly Slovak bearers, which is not that surprising as the Czech page lists mostly Czech bearers. Which is why I think the French and German pages are illuminating, showing a mix of West Slavic, South Slavic, and Hungarian bearers of the name. So, no, I don't have a source for Molnar, but neither do you. I just clicked the link and investigated throughout wikipedia and kept the data that was currently in use as it was.

"(edit summary and highlighted words are not reliable sources)" - Here's a tip: click on the highlighted words. That was a message for you, not for wikipedia readers as a whole, it doesn't need to be sourced because it's already a link. Clicking on the name's link in the chart will take you there. There's an entire article on the history of the word Walhaz which is well-sourced. I'm not going to copy and paste a whole retinue of sources in this article because that would be distracting.

There's a verifiable history of your edits on articles to diminish Slovak (or non-Hungarian) influence on articles you want to be more Hungarian-focused, such as this one where when someone correctly identifies someone as Slovak, you call it vandalism and change it to Hungarian. You even DELETED sources just to get your way. Is that not a bias? I think it is. So call it an "appalling personal remark" if you want, but you're nationalistically-biased.JesseRafe (talk) 00:15, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

What is sure Rovibroni provided an academic source at least. Fakirbakir (talk) 21:48, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

The "academic text" does not address the issues it is purportedly being used to cite.JesseRafe (talk) 05:26, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

I would like to ask user JesseRafe to assume good faith and concentrate on the content, not on the contributor(s). Accusations of "revisionist history", "1984" and "diminishing non-Hungarian influence" look a bit paranoid, and can be read as personal attacks. I suggest, the participants of this debate should concentrate on specific issues (not on generalities, since they don't really lead us anywhere) and, most importantly, cite reliable (e.g., academic, scholarly) sources. Cheers, KœrteFa {ταλκ} 11:12, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

About nationalism. Actually, articles of "Molnár" and "Horváth" had clearly biased, nationalist and OR contents such as " The origin of this name is the Slovak Mlynar, meaning the man working with a mlyn (Slovak for mill). Explanation: The horsemen do not use a mill, this facility belongs just to land-workers. " or "The initial holders of this surname most likely were pe ethnic Croats living or working in Hungary. Although with later generations the percentage of Croatian ethnicity was probably watered down, initially the last name was a way of distinguishing a particular first name who happens to be "the Croat," i.e. Ivan Horvath in that initial context meant Ivan "the Croat." " and nobody cared to correct them. I tried to fix the problems after reading this "debate". Article of Kovács had the same problem. [1]Fakirbakir (talk) 11:35, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Yep, these are a bit suspicious and may be original research. KœrteFa {ταλκ} 13:24, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Definitely those individual surnbame articles weren't perfect, and I made some improvements as I went though them, but just basically was perusing for background for all the non-obvious Magyar names and culled from them info that supported them not being originally Magyar. The issue was Rovibroni has a clear history of making edits to aggrandize Hungarian influence. See the earlier talk about Slovakia on this page, or in his/her edit history the edits made where Rovibroni deleted sources and called them "vandalism" when they said some historical figure was Slovak not Hungarian as he/she wanted to say without sourcing. This user also even claimed names like "Lukas" and "Simon" were originally Hungarian. It was tiresome, and not meant to be a personal attack, but there was a clear evidence of systematic bias from Rovibroni in addition to unsupportable claims, e.g. "This has been Hungarian since 1330!" completely ignoring the meaning of "origin", the concept of "loanwords", and the science of historical linguistics. JesseRafe (talk) 19:16, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

This is getting more and more ridiculous. I'm wating for the next "best-seller" about me and my edits:).--Rovibroni (talk) 22:24, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

I'm not just trying to pick fights or libel you. But everything I've said about your editing bias is documented. What did I accuse you of? Deleting references to Slovak ethnicity and calling it "vandalism"? Right here: Alexander Rudnay Taking native Slavic (or at least native Indo-European (which also includes Germanic, Latin, and Greek languages)) words and calling them "Hungarian"? Maybe you did that here? #Slovakia (Including, of all things, Croatian's native endonym!!!) And, also, calling biblical Hebrew names "Hungarian" as can be seen here: #Hungary So, yeah, pure fictional "best-seller" material that I was making up about you. You're right, it's ridiculous. JesseRafe (talk) 22:52, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

Hmm, let's concentrate on the content, instead. I have updated the origin of the name "Lakatos", as according to a Hungarian Etymological Dictionary (see the article), the word "lakat" was most likely taken from Italian. The Italians might took it from French, though. Anyway, our common goal is to improve Wikipedia, so let's bring our sources and update the suspicious parts, in other articles, too. Cheers, KœrteFa {ταλκ} 11:00, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

Dear Jesse Rafe! This is the talk page of the List of the most common surnames in Europe, it’s not a talk page about me. You wrote a novel about me and my editing habits (and you still can’t stop). This is a personal attack.(„Comment on content, not on the contributor.”). I’ve never written about you. Best wishes.--Rovibroni (talk) 11:09, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

I understand Rovibroni's source. These surnames with Hungarian writing, irrespective of their origin, have been counted as Hungarian names since the Middle Ages. Fakirbakir (talk) 12:07, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

That's my point, it's not about you. So when you make your disruptive, nonconstructive edits, they will continue to be undone and reverted. Personal attack would be if I called you a name or accused you of something you're not. All I did was point out things you have done, that is not a personal attack. You act as if I'm crazy and accusing you of off-the-wall shenanigans when if you look at this Talk Page, it's all you complaining about how I remove your edits. My responses have always been explanations why I did so. End of story. As I said, "let's accept Rovibroni's edits with grain of salt and work to make these articles well-cited, factually-sound, scientifically backed-up, and neutral without national biases" JesseRafe (talk) 13:22, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

• Koertefa, re: lakatos Some brief research revealed the the Italians did get the word from the French, but the French got the word from the middle-English (or Anglo-Saxon, sources differ) word "loc" and that all over wiktionary (in English and French) various etymologies all refer to an (proto-) English, Dutch, Scandic or otherwise Germanic source. I think it's best that we not get bogged down in where the loanword came into Hungarian, but use the actual origin, as best as can be traced, in this case "Germanic" or, some way of saying its origin is "Germanic, loanword via Romance"? My personal opinion is that anything in this column should be short and sweet, too much distracts. Also why I didn't add sources when I tracked those two names down, felt they didn't belong. Also interesting is that the South and West Slavic languages again have the same word, lokot or lakat or similar (lokot). Italian WT didn't have an etymology for lucchetto, but French and English WTs cite proto-Germanic for lock and locket and loquet. JesseRafe (talk) 13:55, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

This talk page is full of your writings about me and my editing habits and you keep writing personal remarks ("You act as...").--Rovibroni (talk) 15:32, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

As evidence of why I deleted/reverted your edits when you were edit-warring on them and deleting/changing content. End of story. Either contribute something or drop it. I've moved on, get back to the article. JesseRafe (talk) 18:25, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia

Based on territory Georgia and Azerbaijan can be defined as European countries. Armenia is a special case, but from historical and political points of view (and this article deals with peoples) it belongs to Europe. See:

• Definition of Europe or Sovereign states in Europe

Fakirbakir (talk) 09:26, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

I agree these belong in Europe because they're treated as Europe on other pages througout wikipedia. Also, Wutholen, may be interested to know that France is in South America, and depending on how you view the Caribbean may be in North America too, so really poor counter-example. JesseRafe (talk) 19:09, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Actually, now I think the best compromise might be to keep the three states (as well as Turkey or/and Kazakhstan if one were so inclined) in both articles. I'm an inclusivist by nature, and nobody ever said these two articles have to be exclusive, so might as well make them exhaustive. JesseRafe (talk) 19:49, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Linking

How come some section headings are linked but others aren't? George8211^{what did I break now?} 21:50, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

Italian?

The article says that Lakatos (Hungarian surname) is Italian in origin. I cannot find an Italian noun meaning "locksmith" or something similar with that form. Could someone please put in additional references?--Carnby (talk) 22:55, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

niemi = peninsula or cape?

Xx236 (talk) 14:02, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

"Funny" spam or serious?

Down in "Netherlands" => "or, more realistically, the hill"?! Obviously "Berg" is mountain (in german anyway). 46.126.165.30 (talk) 09:46, 10 May 2016 (UTC)

Kazakhstan, Cyprus, Israel, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Syria, and Lebanon

Since the list includes Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, why not also these countries? Kazakhstan has territory in Europe, and Israel participates in European events such as Eurovision, not to mention its obvious historical ties. Cyprus is an EU member. We should also consider Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia. Algeria was a member of European Communities as a full-fledged part of France. While the EU rejected Morocco's application, it clearly signalled that it is also a European country, though it may not be especially democratic. We should also consider Syria and Lebanon, which was parts of Byzantium and early converts to Christianity, which signifies a European tie. Also, consider excluding Belarus because it is a dictatorship and the UK because of Brexit. Humanophage (talk) 13:47, 26 September 2017 (UTC)

All those countries can be dealt with in the continents to which they are conventionally assigned, as in List of most common surnames in Asia, and the page for Africa should be created. --Jotamar (talk) 16:50, 26 September 2017 (UTC)

Exclude Belarus and the UK? Whatever you're smoking, I wouldn't mind some. Of the rest, you could add Kazakhstan and Cyprus but not the rest. Mulder1982 (talk) 12:26, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

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