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82-510: Altschul or Altshul is a Jewish surname of Ashkenazi origin. It is derived from the Altschul, Old Synagogue in Prague . Altschul is the surname of: Altshul is the surname of Jewish surname Jewish surnames are family names used by Jews and those of Jewish origin. Jewish surnames are thought to be of comparatively recent origin; the first known Jewish family names date to

164-405: A kinnui -like system, sometimes choosing between already existing ones (such as Pizarro/Pissarro, Mendes, Fonseca, Calle, Fernandes or Rodrígues); even given names (for example, de Jesus or de Miguel). Julio Caro Baroja , supporting José Leite de Vasconcelos ' thesis in his "Anthroponymy Portuguesa, 4" argues, for example, that the surnames related to calle ( English : "street"), that would be

246-463: A common object or tool of a profession: e.g., Hammer for a blacksmith, Feder ("quill") for a scribe, and Lein ("linen") for a dealer in cloth; Balsam a dealer in Balsam. There are other occupational names that are more distinctively related to Jewish culture and religious roles: Dayan (Jewish religious judge in a Beth din); Parnass, Derus, Gabbay, Singer, Cantor , Voorsanger , Chazan , Cantarini , from

328-1535: A false patronymic was the first Israeli Prime Minister , David Ben-Gurion , whose original family name was Grünberg,"green mountain" in German, but adopted the name "Ben-Gurion" ("son of the lion cub"), not "Ben-Avigdor" (his father's name). Most of the Jews in Iran had no permanent surnames before Reza Shah . After surnames became mandatory, many Persian Jews employed job related names as their surnames. Many Jews worked in non-Muslim professions like goldsmith, silversmith, dealers of coins, money changing and seller of spirits. Others engaged in medicine, silk manufacturing and weaving, locksmith, tailors, shoe makers, merchants of second hand items. Many other Jews were engaged in jewelry trading, opium and wine manufacturing, musicians, dancers, scavengers, peddlers and other professions that were generally deemed non-respectful. Many Jews adopted these professions as their surnames, such as Abrishami (silk maker), Almasi (diamond maker), Boloorian (crystal maker), Dehghan (wealthy farmer), Fallah (farmer), Zarrinkoob, Javaherian, Gohari (gold seller), Noghrehforosh (silversmith), Mesforosh (coppersmith), Sarraf, Sarrafan, Sarraf Nezhad, Banki (money changer), Zargar, Zarshenas (goldsmith), Hakakian or Hakkakian (connected with raw material, finished product or implements associated with that trade) for example Roya Hakakian. Jews in Iran also employed

410-608: A part of the Sephardic Jewish diaspora , though few people benefited from it in practice. The decree was then formally and symbolically revoked on 16 December 1968 by the regime of Francisco Franco , following the Second Vatican Council . This was a full century after Jews had been openly practising their religion in Spain and synagogues were once more legal places of worship under Spain's Laws of Religious Freedom. In 2015,

492-600: A patronymic surname, became common throughout the Iberian peninsula. Among the Jews of Spain and Portugal, it had the hidden meaning "the lion of Israel is on high." A well-known Arias was the humanist and Hebraist Benito Arias Montano . Sephardic Jews who settled in Wallachia , Romania, coming from Trani , Italy, in the 1700s began to adopt Mitrani as their surname with a reference to their city. The Ḥen family appears to have adopted

574-410: A provision mandating fixed legal surnames for Sephardic Jews, but it was not until the 17th and 18th centuries that the rest of Europe followed suit. The Kingdom of Prussia began sequentially requiring Jews in its eastern provinces to adopt surnames in the 1790s, an edict affirmed by Napoleon Bonaparte following his invasion of Prussia in 1812. Surnames were derived from a variety of sources, such as

656-555: A replacement for the traditional Hebrew patronymic form. A popular form to create a new family name using Jewish patronymics sometimes related to poetic Zionist themes, such as ben Ami ("son of my people"), or ben Artzi ("son of my country"), and sometimes related to the Israeli landscape, such as bar Ilan ("son of the trees"). Others have created Hebrew names based on phonetic similarity with their original family name: Golda Meyersohn became Golda Meir . Another famous person who used

738-658: A secular occupation or place names. The majority of Jewish surnames used today developed in the past three hundred years. Historically, Jews used Hebrew patronymic names. In the Jewish patronymic system the first name is followed by either ben- or bat- ("son of" and "daughter of," respectively), and then the father's name. ( Bar- , "son of" in Aramaic , is also seen.) Permanent family surnames exist today but only gained popularity among Sephardic Jews in Iberia and elsewhere as early as

820-875: A translation of the name of their home village, Gracia, near Barcelona . Indeed, among the Sephardi the tendency to adopt family names from localities is largely developed; hence were derived such names as Espinosa , Gerondi , Cavalleria , De La Torre , del Monte , Lousada , and Villa Real . The name Sasportas deserves special attention, as it is really the Balearic dialectal form of La Porta . Many families, especially among New Christians (Jewish converts to Catholicism) and Crypto-Jews , but not restricted to them, took Spanish and Portuguese family names, sometimes using translations (such as Vidal or de Vidas for Hayyim , Lobos for Zev , de Paz for Shalom , and de la Cruz or Espírito Santo for Ruah ); phonetic similarities according to

902-546: Is another Sephardi Jewish last name and is derived from the root word Torah ( תּוֹרָה ‎) in Hebrew; Avinbruch or Auerbach corresponding to Ibn Baruch ; and Beizaee, corresponding to Iza (Hebrew root for "God is perfection"). Hagen corresponds to Hassan or Hazan ; and the like. Biblical names often take curious forms in the Iberian records, Isaac appearing as Acaz , Cohen as Coffen or Coffe, Yom-Ṭob as Bondia , Ẓemaḥ as Crescas and/or Cresquez . Arias ,

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984-552: Is being processed, Sephardi Jews are entitled to the consular protection of the Kingdom of Spain. This makes Spain unique among European nations as the only nation that currently grants automatic citizenship to the descendants of Jews expelled during the European medieval evictions . Although these measures are popular in the Jewish community, they have also sparked some controversy. A minority of thinkers hold that these policies represent less

1066-555: Is part of these New Christian families that emerge around the time due to persecution. Members adopted the Portuguese last name of Nunes da Costa and the Curiel family were ennobled by João IV of Portugal June 14, 1641. Jews have historically used Hebrew patronymic names. While permanent family surnames started appearing among Sephardic Jews in Iberia and elsewhere as early as the 10th or 11th century, they did not spread widely to

1148-742: Is the name of a Prague family that settled in the Netherlands before going over to England. The name Gordon may in some cases be derived from the Russian Grodno but is also said to have been adopted by Jews in the Russian Empire in honor of Lord George Gordon (1751–1793), a Scottish nobleman who converted to Judaism in 1787 in Birmingham. From Poland have come names such as Polano , Pollock , Polack , Polak , Pollak , Poole , Pool , and Polk . The names Altschul or Altschuler are derived from

1230-655: The Frankfurter Judengasse gave rise to the names of some of the best known of Jewish families: Rothschild ("red shield "), Schwarzschild ("black shield"), Adler ("eagle"), Ganz or Gans (" goose "), Strauß (" ostrich "), and Ochs ("ox"). Some names may seem to be derived artificially, but can also refer to towns, e.g., Birnbaum (translated into " Peartree "), Rosenberg , Kornberg , Sommerfeld , Grünberg (hence Greenberg ), Goldberg , and Rubinstein / Rubenstein . The English Crawcour (cf. Siegfried Kracauer ) comes from Cracow , while van Praag (h)

1312-860: The Altschul ("old school/synagogue") of Prague. Sephardic surnames, as already mentioned, are almost invariably local, as Almanzi , Arwa and Aruesti (from Hervas ), Bejarano (from Bejar ), Castro , Carvajal , Espinosa /Spinoza, Silva , Leon , Navarro , Robles , Sevilla (Spanish), and Almeida , Carvallo , Lisbona , Miranda , Paiva , Pimentel , Porto , Pieba and Verdugo (Portuguese). Many Italian names are also of this class, as Alatino , Di Cori (from Cori ), Genovese (from Genoa ), Meldola , Montefiore , Mortara , Pisa , Rizzolo , Romanelli (with its variants Romanin , Romain , Romayne , and Romanel ), Sonnino , Vitalis (from Jaim or Chaim and its variants Vidal, Vidale and Vidas); Verdugo and its variants Berdugo, Bardogo, Paradiso an anagram for

1394-603: The Ashkenazic Jews of Germany or Eastern Europe until later. However, Non-Ashkenazi Jews who had immigrated to what was considered Ashkenaz (such as Sephardic Jews who fled the Inquisition) would often keep their surnames and/or Ashkenazize them (e.g., "Melamad" was kept; "Leoni" would be Ashkenazized to " Leib "), and some of the already-settled Jews in communities in large cities (such as Prague or Frankfurt am Main ) began to adopt various surnames. Surnames derived from

1476-805: The Christian re-conquest of Iberia , the Muslim kingdoms in Spain became less welcoming to the dhimmi . In the late 12th century, the Muslims in al-Andalus invited the fanatical Almohad dynasty from North Africa to push the Christians back to the North. After they gained control of the Iberian Peninsula, the Almohads offered the Jews a choice between expulsion, conversion, and death. Many Jewish people fled to other parts of

1558-620: The Edict of Tolerance , the Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II issued a decree called Das Patent über die Judennamen which compelled the Jews to adopt German surnames. Prussia did so soon after, beginning with Silesia : the city of Breslau in 1790, the Breslau administrative region in 1791, the Liegnitz region in 1794. In 1812, when Napoleon had occupied much of Prussia, surname adoption

1640-697: The Islamic world , which allowed them to flourish, and made Jewish enclaves in Muslim Iberian cities great centers of learning and commerce. This led to a flowering of Jewish culture in Spain during the Middle Ages , as Jewish scholars were able to gain favor in Muslim courts as skilled physicians, diplomats, translators, and poets. Although Jews never enjoyed equal status to Muslims, in some Taifas , such as Granada , Jewish men were appointed to very high offices, including that of Grand vizier . The Reconquista , or

1722-551: The Middle Ages , in the 10th and 11th centuries. Jews have some of the largest varieties of surnames among any ethnic group, owing to the geographically diverse Jewish diaspora , as well as cultural assimilation and the recent trend toward Hebraization of surnames . Some traditional surnames relate to Jewish history or roles within the religion, such as Cohen ("priest"), Levi , Shulman ("synagogue-man"), Sofer ("scribe"), or Kantor (" cantor "), while many others relate to

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1804-629: The University of Leicester and the Pompeu Fabra University has indicated an average of nearly 20% for Spaniards having some direct patrilineal descent from populations from the Near East which colonized the region either in historical times, such as Jews and Phoenicians , or during earlier prehistoric Neolithic migrations. Between the 90,000 Jews who converted under the Visigoth persecutions, and

1886-522: The government of Spain passed a law allowing dual citizenship to Jewish descendants who apply, to "compensate for shameful events in the country's past". Thus, Sephardic Jews who could prove that they are the descendants of those Jews expelled from Spain because of the Alhambra Decree would "become Spaniards without leaving home or giving up their present nationality". The Spanish law expired in 2019 and new applications for Spanish citizenship on

1968-524: The "sacred" name, used only in religious connections, grew commensurately. Among the Sephardim , this practice was common long before the exile from Spain , and probably became still more common as a result of the example of the conversos , who upon adopting Christianity accepted in most cases the family names of their godfathers. Among the Ashkenazim , whose isolation from the mainstream majority population in

2050-495: The 100,000+ Jews who converted in the years leading up to expulsion, it is likely that many of these people have Jewish ancestry. Genetic studies have explored local beliefs in the American South West that Spanish Americans are the descendants of conversos. The Spanish government has actively pursued a policy of reconciliation with the descendants of its expelled Jews. In 1924, the regime of Primo de Rivera granted

2132-458: The 10th or 11th century and did not spread widely to the Ashkenazic Jews of Germany or Eastern Europe until the 18th and 19th centuries, where the adoption of German surnames was imposed in exchange for Jewish emancipation . European nations gradually undertook legal endeavors with the aim of enforcing permanent surnames in the Jewish populations. Part of the Alhambra Decree of 1492 contained

2214-493: The 13th century to combat the Albigensian heresy . However, the focus of this new Inquisition was to find and punish conversos who were practicing Judaism in secret. These issues came to a head during Ferdinand and Isabella's final conquest of Granada. The independent Islamic Emirate of Granada had been a tributary state to Castile since 1238. Jews and conversos played an important role during this campaign because they had

2296-786: The 1490s, parts of the Mediterranean world, including Morocco were experiencing severe famine. As a result, a number of cities in Morocco refused to let the Spanish Jews in. This led to mass starvation among the refugees, and made the Jewish refugees vulnerable to the predation of slavers, although the regional ruler invalidated many of these sales within a few years. A good number of the Jews who had fled to North Africa returned to Spain and converted. The Jews who stayed in North Africa often intermingled with

2378-588: The Book " and treated as dhimmi , which was a protected status. Compared to the repressive policies of the Visigothic Kingdom , who, starting in the sixth century had enacted a series of anti-Jewish statutes which culminated in their forced conversion and enslavement, the tolerance of the Muslim Moorish rulers of al-Andalus allowed Jewish communities to thrive. Jewish merchants were able to trade freely across

2460-539: The Catholic monarchs were concerned with the souls of their subjects, and Catholic doctrine held that the persecution of converts would remove an important incentive for conversion. Returnees are documented as late as 1499. A majority of Spain's Jewish population had converted to Christianity during the waves of religious persecutions prior to the Decree—a total of 200,000 converts according to Joseph Pérez. The main objective of

2542-442: The Hebrew honorific title " ben kavod rabbi ," which signifies "son of the honorable rabbi", Benmohel (one variant of which is Mahler ), son of one who performed circumcision , the sacred rite of Abraham. A number of Arabic names are of similar origin: Al-Fakhkhar , a potter; Mocatta , a mason or possibly a soldier ( Al-Muḳatil ). Alhambra Decree In 1924, the regime of Primo de Rivera granted Spanish citizenship to

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2624-414: The Hebrew patronymic form (ben or bas/bat with the father's name) is still used in Jewish religious and cultural life. It is used in the synagogue and in documents in Jewish law , such as the ketubah (marriage contract). Surnames were not unknown among the Jews of the Middle Ages, and as Jews began to mingle more with their fellow citizens, the practice of using or adopting civic surnames in addition to

2706-529: The Jewish community in Portugal (perhaps then some 10% of that country's population) Christians by royal decree unless they left the country. In return, he promised the Inquisition would not come to Portugal for 40 years. He then seized the Jews who tried to leave and had them forcibly baptized, after separating them from their children. It was years before the Jews who fled to Portugal were allowed to emigrate. When

2788-468: The Jewish community in the Beth Yaacov Synagogue . The King said, " Sefarad (the Hebrew name for Spain) isn't a nostalgic memory anymore; it is a place where it must not be said that Jews should simply 'feel' at home there, for indeed Hispano-Jews are at home in Spain...What matters is not accountability for what we may have done wrong or right, but the willingness to look to the future, and analyze

2870-502: The Jewish community viewed conversos with compassion, because Jewish law held that conversion under threat of violence was not necessarily legitimate. Although the Catholic Church was also officially opposed to forced conversion, under ecclesiastical law all baptisms were lawful, and once baptized, converts were not allowed to rejoin their former religion. From the thirteenth to the sixteenth centuries, European countries expelled

2952-522: The Jews from their territories on at least fifteen occasions. Before the Spanish expulsion, the Jews had been expelled from England in 1290, several times from France between 1182 and 1354, and from some German states. The French case is typical of most expulsions: whether the expulsion was local or national, the Jews usually were allowed to return after a few years. The Spanish expulsion was succeeded by at least five expulsions from other European countries, but

3034-439: The Jews had to sell anything they could not carry: their land, their houses, and their libraries, and converting their wealth to a more portable form proved difficult. The market in Spain was saturated with these goods, which meant the prices were artificially lowered for the months before the deadline. As a result, much of the wealth of the Jewish community remained in Spain. The punishment for any Jew who did not convert or leave by

3116-423: The Jews." A majority of Sephardim migrated to Portugal , where they gained only a few years of respite from persecution . About 600 Jewish families were allowed to stay in Portugal following an exorbitant bribe until the Portuguese king entered negotiations to marry the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella. Caught between his desire for an alliance with Spain and his economic reliance on the Jews, Manuel I declared

3198-640: The Muslim world, and also to the Christian kingdoms, which initially welcomed them. In Christian Spain, Jews functioned as courtiers, government officials, merchants, and moneylenders . Therefore, the Jewish community was both useful to the ruling classes and to an extent protected by them. As the Reconquista drew to a close, overt hostility against Jews in Christian Spain became more pronounced, finding expression in brutal episodes of violence and oppression. In

3280-520: The Muslims there. By 1492, Ferdinand and Isabella had won the Battle of Granada and completed the Catholic Reconquista of the Iberian Peninsula from Islamic forces . However, the Jewish population emerged from the campaign more hated by the populace and less useful to the monarchs. The king and queen issued the Alhambra Decree less than three months after the surrender of Granada. Although Isabella

3362-566: The ability to raise money and acquire weapons through their extensive trade networks. This perceived increase in Jewish influence further infuriated the Old Christians and the hostile elements of the clergy. Finally, in 1491 in preparation for an imminent transition to Castilian territory, the Treaty of Granada was signed by Emir Muhammad XII and the Queen of Castile, protecting the religious freedom of

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3444-513: The abnegation of prejudice as a shift to Philo-Semitism . As of November 2015, 4300 Sephardi Jews have benefited from this law and acquired Spanish citizenship, swearing allegiance to the Spanish Constitution. In 2013, the number of Jews in Spain was estimated to range between 40,000 and 50,000 people. Goldschläger and Orjuela have explored motivations to request citizenship and the ways in which legal provisions, religious associations, and

3526-876: The addition of -jee , thus Benjamin into Benmajee , Abraham into Abrajee , David into Dawoodjee , Jacob into Akkoobjee . Another frequent source for Jewish and German-Jewish surnames is the names of trades and occupations; such names as Kaufmann and Marchant ("merchant") became prominent. Others of the same kind are: Bialasik, Banks , Brauer, Breyer, and Brower ("brewer"); Spielmann ("musician"); Gerber ("tanner"); Goldschmit (Goldsmith); Silverschmit (Silversmith); Steinschneider ("stonecutter"); Graveur ("engraver"); Shoemark or Schumacher ("shoemaker"); Schuster ("cobbler"); Schneider , Schneiders , and Snyders ("tailor"; in Hebrew חייט ‎, Chait /Khait (and at times Hyatt )); Wechsler ("money-changer"); Zimmermann ("Carpenter"). Related, and likewise generically German, names are derived metonymically for

3608-582: The already existing Mizrahi Arabic or Berber speaking communities, becoming the ancestors of the Moroccan, Algerian, Tunisian and Libyan Jewish communities. Many Spanish Jews also fled to the Ottoman Empire , where they were given refuge. Sultan Bayezid II of the Ottoman Empire , learning about the expulsion of Jews from Spain, dispatched the Ottoman Navy to bring the Jews safely to Ottoman lands, mainly to

3690-568: The ban was lifted, many of them fled to the Low Countries , or the Netherlands. Throughout history, scholars have given widely differing numbers of Jews expelled from Spain. However, the figure is likely to be below the 100,000 Jews who had not yet converted to Christianity by 1492, possibly as low as 40,000. Such figures exclude the significant number of Jews who returned to Spain due to the hostile reception they received in their countries of refuge, notably Fes (Morocco). The situation of returnees

3772-477: The basis of Sephardic Jewish family heritage are no longer allowed. However, the descendants of the Jews exiled from the Iberian Peninsula may still apply for Portuguese citizenship . By the end of the 8th century, Arab Muslim forces had conquered and settled most of the Iberian Peninsula . Under Islamic law , the Jews , who had lived in the region since at least Roman times , were considered " People of

3854-619: The cities of Thessaloniki (currently in Greece ) and İzmir (currently in Turkey ). Many of these Jews also settled in other parts of the Balkans ruled by the Ottomans such as the areas that are now Bulgaria, Serbia and Bosnia. Concerning this incident, Bayezid II is alleged to have commented, "those who say that Ferdinand and Isabella are wise are indeed fools; for he gives me, his enemy, his national treasure,

3936-533: The deadline was summary execution . The Sephardi Jews migrated to four major areas: North Africa, the Ottoman Empire, Portugal, and Italy. Some Spanish Jews who emigrated to avoid conversion dispersed throughout the region of North Africa known as the Maghreb . The Jewish scholars and physicians among previous Sephardic immigrants to this area had reinvigorated the Jewish communities in North Africa. However, in

4018-432: The decree was passed, Spain's entire Jewish population was given only four months to either convert to Christianity or leave the country. The edict promised the Jews royal protection and security for the effective three-month window before the deadline. They were permitted to take their belongings with them, excluding "gold or silver or minted money or other things prohibited by the laws of our kingdoms." In practice, however,

4100-597: The early fourteenth century, the Christian kings vied to prove their piety by allowing the clergy to subject the Jewish population to forced sermons and disputations. More deadly attacks came later in the century from mobs of angry Catholics, led by popular preachers, who would storm into the Jewish quarter, destroy synagogues, and break into houses, forcing the inhabitants to choose between conversion and death. Thousands of Jews sought to escape these attacks by converting to Christianity. These Jewish converts were commonly called conversos , Cristianos nuevos , or marranos ;

4182-599: The end of the 18th century after the Partition of Poland and later after the Congress of Vienna the Russian Empire acquired a large number of Jews who did not use surnames. They, too, were required to adopt surnames during the 19th century. In medieval France the use of Biblical names appears to have been more extended, judging by the elaborate lists at the end of Gross's Gallia Judaica . True surnames occurred, especially in

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4264-776: The equivalent in something like a ghetto, are of Jewish origin. This is the case with Alonso Calle, treasurer on the first voyage of Christopher Columbus to the Americas, who was one of the settlers of Sephardic origin who comprised the crew. Some Sephardic or Hidden/Undeclared Jews for fear of persecution or worse felt compelled to anglicize their names (For example, the original, Italianate Principe thus became Prins in early Amsterdam, and Prince in England or early America later on). Anglicized Sephardic families were also known to have intermixed with similar Christian surname communities and family groupings, often later converting. The Curiel family

4346-435: The expulsion of practicing Jews was ensuring the sincerity of the conversions of such a large convert population. Of the 100,000 Jews that remained true to their faith by 1492, an additional number chose to convert and join the converso community rather than face expulsion. Recent conversos were subject to additional suspicion by the Inquisition, which had been established to persecute religious heretics, but in Spain and Portugal

4428-467: The expulsion of the Jews from Spain was both the largest of its kind and, officially, the longest lasting in western European history. Over the four-hundred-year period during which most of these decrees were implemented, the causes of expulsion gradually changed. At first, expulsions of Jews (or absence of expulsions) were exercises of royal prerogatives. Jewish communities in medieval Europe often were protected by and associated with monarchs because, under

4510-463: The family history. The majority of Middle Age surname adoption came from place names (for example Shapiro , from Shpira, Speyer , a Rhenanian city known for its famous Jewish community in the 11th century), often a town name, typically the birthplace of the founder of a rabbinical or other dynasty. These names would permutate to various forms as families moved, such as the original Welsch becoming Wallach, Wlock, or Block. Since these surnames did not have

4592-628: The feudal system, Jews often were a monarch's only reliable source of taxes. Jews further had reputations as moneylenders because they were the only social group allowed to loan money at a profit under the prevailing interpretation of the Vulgate (the Latin translation of the Bible used in Roman Catholic western Europe as the official text), which forbade Christians to charge interest on loans. Jews, therefore, became

4674-411: The final unification of Spain. Although their initial policies towards the Jews were protective, Ferdinand and Isabella were disturbed by reports claiming that most Jewish converts to Christianity were insincere in their conversion. As mentioned above, some claims that conversos continued to practice Judaism in secret (see Crypto-Judaism ) were true, but the "Old" Christians exaggerated the scale of

4756-443: The gradual reconquest of Muslim Iberia by the Christian kingdoms in the North, was driven by a powerful religious motivation: to reclaim Iberia for Christendom following the Umayyad conquest of Hispania centuries before. By the 14th century, most of the Iberian Peninsula (present-day Spain and Portugal ) had been reconquered by the Christian kingdoms of Castile , Aragon , León , Galicia , Navarre , and Portugal . During

4838-458: The lands where they lived was more complete, the use of surnames only started to become common in most places in the eighteenth century. On the other hand, the use of surnames became common very early among the Arabic-speaking Jews, who carried the custom into the Iberian Peninsula (modern Spain and Portugal). Among Sephardi Jews are found such names as Abeldano , corresponding to Ibn el-Danan ; Abencabre , corresponding to Ibn Zabara ; Tongay

4920-657: The largest number. Some refer to well-known cities as Speyer (in the Middle Ages Spira) (hence Shapira or Shapiro ), Posen (hence Posner and Posener , as well as Pozner ), Berlin (hence Berliner and Berlinsky ), Breslau (anglicised to " Bresslaw "), Bingen , Cassel (cf. David Cassel ), Treves (whence, according to some authorities, originated the very popular Alsatian name of Dreyfus ), Dresden , Fulda (hence Foulde ), and Oppenheim ; others, to less familiar towns, like Auerbach , Bischoffsheim , Utting am Ammersee (hence Utting), Hildesheim ( Hildesheimer ), Landshuth , Sulzberg . House signs such as those in

5002-416: The latter term was used as an insult. At first, these conversions seemed an effective solution to the cultural conflict: many converso families met with social and commercial success. But eventually their success made these new Catholics unpopular with their neighbors, including some of the clergy of the Catholic Church and Spanish aristocrats competing with them for influence over the royal families. By

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5084-437: The lenders to and creditors of merchants, aristocrats, and even monarchs. Most expulsions before the Alhambra Decree were related to this financial situation: to raise additional monies, a monarch would tax the Jewish community heavily, forcing Jews to call in loans; the monarch then would expel the Jews; at the time of expulsion, the monarch would seize their remaining valuable assets, including debts owed them by other subjects of

5166-611: The mid-15th century, the demands of the Old Christians that the Catholic Church and the monarchy differentiate them from the conversos led to the first limpieza de sangre laws, which restricted opportunities for converts. These suspicions on the part of Christians were only heightened by the fact that some of the conversions were insincere. Some conversos , also known as crypto-Jews , embraced Christianity and underwent baptism while privately adhering to Jewish practices and faith. Recently converted families who continued to intermarry were especially viewed with suspicion. For their part,

5248-472: The monarch and, in some instances, by the monarch himself. Expulsion of the Jews from Spain was thus an innovation not only in scale but also in its motivations. Hostility towards the Jews in Spain was brought to a climax during the reign of the "Catholic Monarchs," Ferdinand and Isabella . Their marriage in 1469, which formed a personal union of the crowns of Aragon and Castile , with coordinated policies between their distinct kingdoms, eventually led to

5330-457: The name of the matriarch of the family were adopted by some households. For example, the surname Rivkes is derived from the female name Rivkeh, the Yiddish form of Rebecca , so the surname literally means "Rivka's". The Slavic language-influenced counterpart is Rivkin . Other surnames came from the man's trade such as Metzger (butcher) or Becker (baker), and a few derived from personal attributes, such as Joffe (beautiful), or special events in

5412-460: The official status that modern ones do, often the old surname would be dropped and a new one adopted after the family moved their household. Many surnames in the Netherlands derived from the German versions. For example, Waal derived from Wahl and Voorzanger (Chazan) derived from Vorsänger. The process of assigning permanent surnames to Jewish families (most of which are still used to this day) began in Austria. On July 23, 1787, five years after

5494-496: The past in light of our future." From November 2012 Sephardi Jews have had the right to automatic Spanish nationality without the requirement of residence in Spain. Prior to November 2012, Sephardi Jews already had the right to obtain Spanish citizenship after a reduced residency period of two years (versus ten years for foreigners but similar to nationals from Philippines, Equatorial Guinea, Brazil and about 20 other American republics that also require 2 years.) While their citizenship

5576-489: The personal names of ancestors, place names, and occupations. In the 18th century, a custom developed amongst the Eastern European Jews of the Austro-Hungarian and Russian Empires where surnames began being passed from mother to son as opposed from father to son, but the trend seems to have died out by the early 20th century. An exception was members of the Cohanim (priestly caste) and Levites (descendants of Levi) who performed certain religious duties, who had always appended

5658-408: The phenomenon. It was also claimed that Jews were trying to draw conversos back into the Jewish fold. In 1478, Ferdinand and Isabella made a formal application to Rome to set up an Inquisition in Castile to investigate these and other suspicions. In 1487, King Ferdinand promoted the establishment of the Spanish Inquisition Tribunals in Castile. In the Crown of Aragon, it had been first instituted in

5740-451: The possibility of obtaining Spanish citizenship to a part of the Sephardic Jewish diaspora. As stated above, the Alhambra decree was officially revoked in 1968, after the Second Vatican Council rejected the charge of deicide traditionally attributed to the Jews. In 1992, in a ceremony marking the 500th anniversary of the Edict of Expulsion, King Juan Carlos (wearing a yarmulke ) prayed alongside Israeli president Chaim Herzog and members of

5822-445: The prejudice of the time, a person with Jewish blood was untrustworthy and inferior. Such measures slowly faded away as converso identity was forgotten and this community merged into Spain's dominant Catholic culture . This process lasted until the eighteenth century, with a few exceptions, most notably the Chuetas of the island of Majorca , where discrimination lasted into early 20th Century. A Y chromosome DNA test conducted by

5904-954: The race of Japhet and from the Tribe of Levite ). The purpose of Levian at the end is to distinguish from Muslim Jafar nezhad (From the race of Japhet). Many Jews employed the Turkish suffix -chi (meaning "merchant of") to denote their profession. Examples of such include Abrishamchi (silk merchant), Saatchi (watch seller), Talachi (gold seller), Noghrechi (silver seller), Arakchi (merchant of alcoholic drinks), Meschi (copper merchant), Aeenechi (merchant of mirrors), etc. Many modern Jewish surnames are toponyms , names derived from place names. There are general names like Deutsch , Frank , Franco , Frankel , and more localized ones from almost every European country. The Netherlands has contributed Leuwarden , Neumegen , Limburg , van Thal , and various other vans , as van Ryn ( Rhine ), etc. Germany has contributed

5986-433: The race of Japhet). Levite and Kohanim surnames became Lavi, Lavaee, Lavi Zadeh, Lavaeeian, Kohan, Kohan pour (son of a Kohen), etc. Many Persian last names consisted of three parts in order to distinguish from other families with similar last names. Some Persian Jewish families that had similar surnames to their Muslim neighbors added a second surname at the end of their last names. As an example Jafar nezhad Levian (From

6068-414: The son of or daughter of patronymics, using Persian suffixes such as -pour (son of), -zadeh (born of), -nezhad (from the race of) and -ian (from the group of). Some examples of these names include Davoud pour (son of David), Davoud nezhad (from the seed of David), Davoud zadeh (born of David), Rabbi pour (son of a rabbi), Rabbi zadeh (born of a rabbi), Yaghoub pour (son of Jacob) and Jafar nezhad (from

6150-525: The south, like Farissol, Bonet, Barron, Lafitte; but as a rule local designations were popular, such as "Samson of Sens", etc. Many immigrants to modern Israel change their names to Hebrew names, to erase remnants of exiled life still surviving in family names from other languages. This phenomenon is especially common among Ashkenazic Jewish immigrants to Israel , because most of their surnames were taken recently, and many were imposed by authorities in Europe as

6232-677: The surnames Cohen and Levi respectively (modern spelling in English may vary), which were usually preceded by ha- meaning "the" in Hebrew. These names are seen in many various forms today, all coming from this root. For example, the name Levine in English-speaking countries, the name Löw in Germanic countries and the names Levi, Lévai, or Lévay in Hungary, Europe, or America. Although Ashkenazi Jews now use European or modern-Hebrew surnames for everyday life,

6314-410: The synagogue officials who were so called; Shochet , Schaechter , Schechter , from the ritual slaughterer (also Schub or Shub: Hebrew acronym for shochet u-bodek , ritual slaughterer and kosher meat inspector); Shadkun , a marriage-broker; Rabe , Rabinowitz , Rabinovich , Rabinowicz , and Rabbinovitz , rabbis (occasionally Anglicized to Robinson or Robbins ); Behar /Bahar, abbreviation of

6396-563: The word diaspora (dispersion). Even in the East there are names of these last two classes, Barron (from BarOn ), Galante , Veneziani , though there are a few Arabic names like Alfandari and Ḥaggis; Greek, as Galipapa and Pappo ; and a few Turkish, as Jamila , Gungur , Bilbil, and Sabad . Going still farther east, the curious custom which prevails among the Bene Israel may be mentioned of changing Biblical names to similar Hindu names with

6478-529: Was focused on finding crypto-Jews. Although Judaism was not considered a heresy, professing Christianity while engaging in Jewish practices was heretical. Additionally, Limpieza de sangre statutes instituted legal discrimination against converso descendants, barring them from certain positions and forbidding them from emigrating to the Americas. For years, families with urban origins who had extensive trade connections, and people who were learned and multilingual were suspected of having Jewish ancestry. According to

6560-681: Was legalized with the Ordinance of 10 November 1492 which established that civil and church authorities should be witnesses to baptism and, in the case that they were baptized before arrival, proof and witnesses of baptism were required. Furthermore, all property could be recovered by returnees at the same price at which it was sold. Similarly the Provision of the Royal Council of 24 October 1493 set harsh sanctions for those who slandered these New Christians with insulting terms such as tornadizos . After all,

6642-453: Was mandated for the unoccupied parts; and Jews in the rest of Prussia adopted surnames in 1845. Napoleon also, in a decree of July 20, 1808, insisted upon the Jews adopting fixed names. His decree covered all lands west of the Rhine; and many other parts of Germany required surname-adoption within a few years. The city of Hamburg was the last German state to complete the process, in 1849. At

6724-475: Was the force behind the decision, her husband Ferdinand did not oppose it. That her confessor had just changed from the tolerant Hernando de Talavera to the very intolerant Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros suggests an increase in royal hostility towards the Jews. The text of the decree accused the Jews of trying "to subvert the holy Catholic faith" by attempting to "draw faithful Christians away from their beliefs." These measures were not new in Europe . After

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