Origin of Belarusian surnames. The most common Belarusian surnames: list, origin Belarusian female surnames

29/09/12
what stupid sheep... apparently they once heard of Abramovich and Rabinovich... and now they think that all people with such surnames are Jews... surnames with the ending "-vic2 "-ich" are traditional surnames of Serbs, Croats, as well as Belarusians and Poles and sometimes other Slavs (except Russians).

scramasax, 29/09/12
Vich are Serbian and Belarusian surnames, but they can also be Jewish. As is the case with the above gentlemen.

29/09/12
Naumova Ekaterina, the main thing is the root of the surname, not the ending. the ancestors of ABRAMovich and Berezovsky came from the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, where surnames ending in -vic (Belarusian) and -ovsky (Polish) were common, so they were called that way - in the Slavic manner. I meant people who believe that ALL names with this ending are Jewish. This is simply absurd.

VovaCelt, 29/09/12
During the Second World War there was such a German field marshal - Manstein. Well, wow - just a double Jew! Both “man” and “stein” at the same time. Well, now let's get serious. Jews are a specific people, “scattered” across many countries and even continents for two thousand years. And the Jews borrowed a lot from the peoples among whom they lived. From the same Germans, because there were many Jews in medieval Germany. And even the Jewish language “Yiddish” is a slightly “altered” German, that is, the language of German Jews, which has nothing in common with the original Jewish language “Hebrew,” which is much closer to Arabic. And all these “viches” are a “trace” of the once large Jewish diaspora in Eastern Europe. And this trace is Slavic.

Maxwell1989, 30/09/12
2344 I think he said everything

Theodosius, 07/10/12
vich is a Slavic ending; it’s just that many Jews took Polish and Ukrainian surnames. So it’s not a fact. By the way, the famous Soviet symphonic composer Dmitry Shostakovich was Belarusian. And what do you say, the President of Ukraine Yanukovych and General Mladic are also Jews?

xNevidimkax, 07/10/12
they're not Jewish, they're just HIV xDDDDDDDD ahahahahah lol No offense, I'm just laughing xDDDD

scandmetal, 08/01/16
But this is nonsense. Jews are a people scattered throughout the world, and in each country their surnames are formed “according to the language” of that country. Originally Jewish surnames - such as Cohen, Levi and maybe 10-12 more. But for example, Levin is not from our word “lion”, but from the position of Levite, only for convenience it is stylized as Russian (“-in”). -Man, -Berg and -Stein are German-speaking surnames, but among Georgian Jews they end in -shvili. Vich is a South Slavic type of surname. And among them there are obviously non-Jewish ones.

EvlampiyInkubatorovich, 09/01/16
Surnames ending in "vich" are not Jewish surnames. Jewish surnames end in "in" and "an". Maybe something else, but definitely not “vich”. By and large, I don’t care whether a Jew or a Russian, at this time all nations are the same, you can’t tell them apart, and people differ only on religious grounds.

Field, 18/01/16
Yes, this is nonsense. Someone heard about Rabinovich and Abramovich and: “Yeah, they’re Jews!” Now I know them! But not quite like this: -ich or –ovich, -evich. Rabinovich says that the Jews passed through Slavic countries. And the surnames are primarily Serbian, but secondarily Polish. Serbs are Petrovic, Obradovic, Zivkovic, Milutinovic, Jorgovanovic, or according to a simpler model: Grajic, Mladic. And the Poles are Tyshkevich, Sienkiewicz, Stankevich, Yatskevich, Palkevich, Pavlyukevich, Lukashevich, Borovich, Urbanovich, Kurylovich. Well, Jews may have such surnames, but they are still Polish. As for Yanukovych, he doesn’t look like a Jew at all :) It’s rare among the Ukrainians, but there are Odarichs, Khristichs, Katerinichs. This is how we write them, but in reality they are Odarych, Khrystych, Katerynych. It sounds terrible, but that is why it is necessary to write as it really is, if we are talking about Ukrainians, and especially about broad ones. So that all the ugliness of Ukromov is in full view.

In Latin, the word "surname" means "family". People first began to be given different surnames in the tenth century in Italy. Belarusian surnames gained popularity in the fifteenth century. Belarusians still use their family nicknames. Sometimes they captivate the ear with their beauty, and sometimes they evoke such an emotion as laughter. A list of surnames, their meaning and origin is presented below. It is worth noting that every person should know about the history of the origin of their family name. This information allows us to get to the origins of the whole genus. More often than others in Belarus, surnames were formed depending on the place of residence, type of activity and the name of the father.

Sources of origin of Belarusian surnames

During the existence of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania on the territory of modern Belarus, they began to give people not only first names, but also surnames. The origin of Belarusian surnames dates back to the reign of Prince Mindaugas. Then it was customary to give surnames to people of the princely or noble class. Serfs received only “nicknames”, which united the servants of one house. Their place of residence played a major role in the origin of the surnames of the Belarusian people. Nicknames based on the father's name were also very popular. As an example, we can consider the situation when the father is named Vanya. It turns out that his son automatically becomes Vanin. This surname is one of the common ones, since the name Ivan was found in every village and more than once.

Surnames of noble origin

Belarusian nobles usually received their surnames based on their place of residence, the name of a castle or family estate. Usually, the endings of this kind of personal nicknames were such sets of letters as “ski” or “tski”. As an example, we can consider the situation - a wealthy nobleman lives in a castle called Ostrog, which means he is given the surname Ostrogsky. Belarusian surnames with the ending “-ovich” are often found. Based on this feature, one can immediately determine that the ancestors of a given person were Christians. Such personal nicknames include Petrovich, Demidovich, Martsinovich.

After the settlement of the Jewish population throughout the Principality of Lithuania in the fifteenth century, the first Belarusian surnames with Jewish roots appeared. Their endings were characteristic of the Belarusian people, but despite this, the typical Jewish basis of the surname always distinguished them from the indigenous population. Examples of Belarusian-Jewish surnames are Koganovski, Ribinovich, Gurevich. It is worth noting that Jews influenced the change in Belarusian surnames, but they did not create new ones among them.

Non-noble Belarusian surnames

The appearance of the first Belarusian surnames among the common population is based on a very simple reason. Since many people with the same names lived in villages and hamlets, it was simply necessary to distinguish them somehow. Initially, they were given a nickname, which, in the process of changing generations, began to be passed on to children and grandchildren. Typical suffixes for peasant surnames are “ich”, “onok”, “enya”, “chik”, “uk”. Among the common Belarusian surnames of non-noble origin are Ivanchik, Vaselyuk, Lazichonok. Often, commoners were given nicknames and, as a result, family names associated with their character traits. So, for example, a lazy person was called Lyanutska, a forgetful person - Zabudzko, a snoring person - Sapotska.

Came from Russia

The extensive influence of the Russian people on the culture and life of the Belarusian nation also affected the formation of surnames. Thus, very popular generic names in Belarus with the traditional Russian suffixes “ov”, “in”, “ev” are proof of this. They are especially widespread in the east of the country. The long stay under Russian rule led to the appearance in purely Belarusian surnames of endings characteristic of residents of Muscovy. As a result, many Belarusians living under the patronage of Russia became the owner of two surnames. They wrote one in documents, and named the other in the process of communication. This dual ownership of the surname did not last long, and as a result, the version adapted into the Russian way became unified. The Barys began to be called Borisovs, and the Trakhims Trokhimovs. Many Belarusians renamed their family names in the Russian way on their own initiative. At that time, such surnames as Sakol, Grusha, Shaly came under the influence of fashion, which turned into Sokolov, Grushko, Shallo, respectively.

Making you smile

Often Belarusian surnames have very deep and interesting roots. If earlier some of them were often encountered and did not evoke any emotions, now it is impossible to pronounce them without an involuntary smile. Often the determining factor in choosing a surname was weather conditions, pets, indoor plants and other objects and phenomena encountered in everyday life. Over time, such words turned into common nouns and became full-fledged surnames of Belarusians. The list of funny-sounding surnames includes:

Beetle - given to people with black hair.

Nose - assigned to owners of outstanding noses.

Koloda is a surname characteristic of a plump and clumsy person.

Windmill - that's what the miller was called.

Pear is a surname derived from the name of a tree sacred to the Slavs.

Cancer - this surname was usually given to indecisive people

Borscht is characteristic of people who engage in excessive chatter.

Despite their unusual nature, these are common Belarusian surnames that anyone can encounter in everyday life.

Declension

Before inflecting a Belarusian surname, you need to pay attention to its ending. Declension of the Belarusian surname is carried out according to the rule of writing the case used. There are usually three main principles of declination in practice:

Women's surnames do not change in the process of changing the case; the masculine ending "a" is added. Considering the surname Remizovich as an example, we find that the absence of a man will sound: “No Ivan Remizovich.” For a woman, the form of the surname remains the same: “No Olga Remizovich.”
There is Music, but there is no Music.
Surnames ending in "o" remain the same in any case.

Endings

Today you can find a wide variety of Belarusian surnames. Their endings are also different - it all depends on the origin of the generic name. The most common endings for Belarusian surnames are:

Evich, -ovich - Karpovich, Yashkevich;

Ivich, -lich - Smolich, Savinich;

Ev, -ov - Oreshnikov;

Skiy, -tsky - Polyansky, Neizvitsky;

Onok, -enok - Kovalenok, Savenok;

Ko - Shurko;

Ok - Top;

Enya - Kovalenya;

Yuk, -uk - Martynyuk, Abramchuk;

Ik - Novik;

Ets - Malets.

Top surnames and their meaning

There are a wide variety of Belarusian surnames. Masculine ones are usually distinguished from feminine ones by the change in the ending during declination. But this doesn't always happen. In frequent cases, female Belarusian surnames do not change at all. Women's family names in Belarus, as in Russia, are lost after marriage. The family name is taken from the male side. The TOP 20 popular Belarusian surnames include:

Poznyak - given to a person born late at night.
Tretyak is a surname derived from the name of an ancient coin of the same name.
Ozersky - given to a person whose ancestor lived near the lake.
Zelensky - created on the basis of the worldly name Zelenya, this surname was also assigned to inexperienced people.
Sverdlov - the surname in the past belonged to a carpenter or joiner.
Vanin is the son of Ivan.
Kovalev, the ancestor of the bearer of the surname, was a blacksmith.
Sinitsyn - in honor of the worldly name Sinitsa.
Gomel - the ancestor who received this surname was born or lived in Gomel.
Pinchuk, the first bearer of the surname, was born in the Brest region in the city of Pinsk.
Bystritsky - living in the city of Bystritsa.
Gnatyuk - in honor of the church name Ignatius.
Adamovich is a surname derived from the name Adam.
Krasik is a nickname for a handsome and well-groomed person.
Puzik, the progenitor of the family name, was a plump and well-fed man.
Gavrilyak - formed from the name Gavril.
Brilevsky - the surname comes from the word shaved - lip. Assigned to a person with a plump lip or an overly touchy character.
Taluk - appeared from the nickname Tal, which was given to a person living in a swampy area.
Yurchak was the name given to a man who was fast, nimble and very sneaky.
Avdeenko - associated with the baptismal name Avdey.

Each of the surnames presented above has its own deep history and occupies its due place in the fate of many Belarusians. Knowing the origin of your family name, you can discover new knowledge about your ancestors, their occupation and place of residence. The surname Kovalev is found more often than others in Belarus (more than ten percent of the country’s population), which means that blacksmithing was widely developed in this territory.

Belarusian surnames are often confused with Lithuanian and Jewish ones.
Abramovich is a native Belarusian surname.
Belarusian surnames have been formed over several centuries.
Tatars, Lithuanians, Poles, Russians, and Jews had an influence on the formation of Belarusian family names.
The official adoption of surnames by the entire population of Belarus occurred in the mid-nineteenth century.

History of the origin of Belarusian surnames.

Belarusian surnames (Belarusian nicknames) were formed in the context of a pan-European process. The oldest of them date back to the end of the 14th - beginning of the 15th century, when the territory of the Republic of Belarus was part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania - a multi-ethnic and multi-confessional state. The result of the complex and long path of development of anthroponymy in different regions was the heterogeneity of Belarusian surnames. The main body of Belarusian surnames appeared in the 17th-18th centuries, but they were not stable or obligatory. They became strictly hereditary and legally enshrined only in the 30s of the 20th century.

The Belarusian family system fully reflects the complex and rich political life of the country, and bears traces of numerous cultural influences. For this reason, the bases of Belarusian surnames may contain words related to Lithuanian, Polish, Russian, and Tatar languages. Of the neighboring peoples, only Latvians did not leave any noticeable imprint on the Belarusian family foundation.

The first stable family names were adopted by the magnate families of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (GDL) from the second half of the 15th century. These ancient family names: Sapega, Tyshkevich, Pats, Khodkevich, Glebovich, Nemiro, Iodko, Ilyinich, Ermine, Gromyko - are widespread among Belarusians today.

However, the bulk of representatives of the gentry class in the first half of the 16th century continued to use sliding names after their father, such as Gnevosh Tvoryanovich or Bartosz Olechnowicz, however, like the peasants. By the end of the 16th century, most of the noble families had already acquired permanent family names. Although examples of changes in generic names were common, for example genus Pre-war began to bear the nickname Sologuby etc.

The surnames of the gentry could arise from a patronymic or grandfatherly name (in -ovich/-evich) - Voinilovich, Fedorovich, from the name of the estate or patrimony (on -sky/-tsky) - Belyavsky, Borovsky, or from the nickname of the ancestor - Wolf, Narbut. The family nomenclature that emerged during this period, in its main features, continues to exist in Central and Western Belarus to this day. Almost 60-70% of the original Belarusian surnames from this area are found in Polish armorials and their bearers are namesakes, and often descendants of glorious noble families with a rich history dating back to the very origins of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

Peasant surnames were established in the western and central parts of Belarus throughout the 18th century. The basis for peasant surnames was often drawn from the same fund of gentry surnames, or could originate from purely peasant nicknames - Burak, Kohut. For a long time, the surname of the peasant family was unstable. Often one peasant family bore two or even three parallel existing nicknames, for example, Maxim Nos, also known as Maxim Bogdanovich. However, based on the inventories of estates of the late 17th and early 18th centuries, it can be argued that the bulk of peasant families continue to exist continuously in the areas of their registration from the 17th-18th centuries to the present day.

On the lands of Eastern Belarus, which were transferred to Russia as a result of the first partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1772, surnames were formed at least a hundred years later. In this territory, family suffixes -ov/-ev, -in, characteristic of Russian anthroponymy, have existed since ancient times, but under the rule of the Russian Empire it was this type of surname that became dominant east of the Dnieper and north of the Western Dvina. Due to their later origin, family nests here are smaller than in the western part of the country, and the number of surnames noted in one locality is usually higher. Surnames such as Kozlov, Kovalev, Novikov are repeated from district to district, that is, there are many places where unrelated family nests arise, and, accordingly, the number of carriers is high. This is clearly visible in the list of the most common Belarusian surnames, in which universal eastern surnames -ov/-ev dominate, although the number of bearers of surnames is -ov/-ev among the entire Belarusian population does not exceed 30%.

Unlike Russia, surnames in -ov/-ev in Eastern Belarus are not completely monopolistic, but cover about 70% of the population. An interesting thing is that the original Belarusian surnames on -young, were not formalized here with a suffix -s, but became Ukrainized. For example: Goncharenok is not Goncharenkov, but Goncharenko, Kurilenok is not Kurilenkov, but Kurylenko. Although for

Vadim DERUZHINSKY

“Analytical newspaper “Secret Research”, No. 21, 2006

WHERE DO OUR SURNAMES COME FROM?

Is it possible to determine a person's nationality by their last name? Theoretically, yes, but for this you need to know not only the history of the ethnic group and its language. The most important role here is often played by the political context of the era when national surnames were formed.

Let's say, there is a common opinion that surnames starting with -ev and -ov are supposedly Russian surnames. In fact, these are equally the surnames of dozens of peoples of Central Asia and the Caucasus - numbering tens of millions of people. For example: Dudayev, Aliyev, Nazarbayev, Niyazov, Askarov, Yulaev, Karimov, etc. Surnames with such endings are borne by the population on a vast territory outside of Russia (or outside the Russian territory of Russia), and these are mostly Muslim Turks. How did they get “Russian endings”? Simple: these were the rules for registering surnames in documents of Tsarist Russia.

For this reason, about half of the Russians in Russia have non-Russian surnames: they have not noticed for a long time that the surnames Artamonov, Kutuzov, Karamzin, Latypov and others are of purely Turkic origin and go back to the Horde, when its Tatar peoples were massively converted to Orthodoxy.

Here's another example: why do some Jews have surnames with a German texture (with endings in -stern or -stein), while others have surnames with a Slavic texture (such as Portnoy or Reznik)? It turns out that everything was determined by the strong-willed decision of Catherine II, who, during the division of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, ordered the Jews of Prussia and Courland to have surnames in the German manner, and the Jews of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (Belarus and Western Ukraine) to have surnames in the Slavic manner. Thus, the state decree defined different principles for the design of surnames for the same people - which has happened more than once in history.

With a sufficient degree of purity, we can talk about the origin of only noble surnames, since their spelling was secured by documents on the right of nobility, and this right itself for its bearers was determined by the preservation of the surname in its original spelling. So, even during the German occupation of Prussia-Porussia, the surnames of the local Russian nobility were preserved there in the same spelling: von Steklov, von Belov, von Treskow, von Rusov, etc. The noble status itself preserved these Russian surnames of Pomerania and Polabye from any distortion - although their bearers had long been Germanized for 600 years.

In the same way, in the Grand Duchy of Belarus, the gentry retained their surnames unchanged for centuries, which were not affected by either Polish or later Russian influence, because the aristocracy of both Poland and Russia religiously followed the laws of registration of noble status. And only after 1917 these “conventions” were discarded by the Bolsheviks. In general, over the last 3-6 centuries, only a part of the Litvin-Belarusians had their surnames unchanged: these are the nobility, these are city dwellers, these are persons close to power in the rural area. That is, approximately 30-50% of the population. And the majority of the people, who were simple villagers, did not have surnames in ancient times - there were only clan names, which were either never documented, or changed arbitrarily.

For example, when Russia captured the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Catherine II massively deprived Belarusian nobles or their estates, or noble status in general, while transferring Belarusian lands for use to Russian landowners. Those here not only converted our peasants (for the first time in their history) into serfdom, but also arbitrarily changed their surnames in the usual Russian manner. Thus, in the 19th century, the peasants of Eastern Belarus massively acquired surnames that were unusual for them (although the urban population and gentry retained their original Belarusian surnames). However, these surnames still retained Western Slavic vocabulary: for example, today the most common surname in the Gomel region is Kovalev - while in Russian this surname sounds like Kuznetsov. Kovalev is not a Russian surname, but a Belarusian one, since the word “koval” did not exist in the Russian language; it exists in the Belarusian, Polish and Ukrainian languages. But regarding the ending, this is formally a Russian surname of “production” of the 19th century (like Dudayev, Nazarbayev), since endings in -ev and -ov were not characteristic of the Rusyns of Belarus and Ukraine, neither during their centuries-old life outside Russia, nor Today.

Therefore, speaking about the origin of Belarusian surnames, we should clearly distinguish between our truly ancient surnames and the new surnames that appeared during the registration of Belarusian peasants as subjects of tsarism. But the latter, I repeat, are easy to recognize, because they exactly carry within themselves a linguistic content that is not Russian, but local - just like Caucasian or Asian surnames like Aliyev or Akaev.

NATIONAL PERSON

And one more important point in the issue of Belarusian surnames - directly linked to the question of the very ethnic purity of the people: are we in many ways a mixture of different peoples - or are we maintaining our national identity? After all, it is possible to talk about Belarusian surnames only if the Belarusian ethnic group itself has been preserved for centuries as something more or less constant and unchangeable.

It should be recognized that throughout its history, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania-Belarus remained precisely an ethnic Belarusian state (or then a province in Tsarist Russia). The original local population here has always been at least 80% - and this is a very high figure compared to Ukraine or Russia, which, during their expansion, included the lands of the Horde, Tatars and other ethnic groups. Such a high percentage of the local population meant the complete dissolution of all visitors among them. Which is directly related to our topic of Belarusian surnames.

Here, as an illustration, is a typical example of the influence of the environment of the prevailing ethnic group. Our reader N. writes that her ancestors came to Belarus in 1946, gave birth to two daughters (she is one of them) and a son. The children grew up, married local Belarusians, and their son had a daughter. As a result: none of the heirs now bears their original Russian surname, and the family itself has dissolved in the Belarusian environment, all the heirs have Belarusian surnames, and the children, then grandchildren, etc. - they will increasingly be Belarusians by blood. The original Russian component melts like sugar in the ethnic Belarusian environment with each generation, because it is surrounded by Belarusians, and with each generation it becomes related to an increasing number of Belarusian clans.

This example clearly shows the high stability of the Belarusian ethnic group from external ethnic influence (including in the matter of preserving their ethnic surnames). The marriage of a newcomer with a Belarusian makes the children 50% Belarusian, then the children in 80% of cases (in the country there are 80% of Belarusians) marry again with Belarusians - etc. From a mathematical point of view, after just a few generations, the family of newcomers completely dissolves in the Belarusian ethnic group, acquiring both Belarusian blood and Belarusian surnames. Mathematically, this requires only 3-4 generations, and, according to mathematics, the layer of Russians who came to Belarus in 1946-49. should almost completely disappear without a trace among Belarusians (with the loss of their Russian surnames and blood) by 2025-2050.

Theoretically, a surname can continue to be passed on from father to son until this chain is broken for an indefinitely long time, but with the onset of depopulation in the mid-twentieth century, 1-2 children are born in families, and the chances of continuity of this chain have become extremely low. If we assume that in the next generation only either a son or a daughter can be born to an heir, then the chances are already 50%, and the possibility of preserving a surname alien to Belarus after 4 generations becomes unlikely, since its loss is caused by the first birth of a daughter.

Of course, a daughter may not accept the surname of her Belarusian husband and give the children her own surname - but this happens extremely rarely, and more often we see a different process - when non-Belarusians in the Belarusian environment try to consciously give their children Belarusian surnames. So, for example, our Jews largely disappeared without a trace in the Belarusian environment (both formally and genetically), because in the Judeophobic USSR, children were often given not the surname of their Jewish father, but the Belarusian surname of their mother (hundreds of thousands of examples). Likewise, a Belarusian woman who marries a southerner with the last name, say, Mukhameddinov, in most cases will leave her local surname to the children. Here the chain of inheritance of the surname is interrupted immediately.

As we see, the organism of an ethnic group (as elsewhere in the world) successfully “digests” the names of newcomers after several generations into its local ones. Moreover, not only surnames, but also the descendants of immigrants themselves become genetically local population with each generation, preserving after several generations only imperceptible grains of their original blood.

All this, in a broad sense, proves the very fact (otherwise refuted) of the existence of the Belarusian ethnic group as an original and sovereign part of the common Slavic ethnic group. And the fact of the existence of purely Belarusian surnames is also a manifestation of the national content of the people.

BELARUSIAN SURNAMES

The Belarusian philologist Yanka Stankevich, in No. 4 of the magazine “Belarusian Journal” (August-September 1922) and in the work “Fatherland among the Belarusians,” provided an analysis of Belarusian surnames - which, as far as I know, has not yet been repeated to such an extent and unbiasedly by Belarusian scientists. This is what the philologist wrote (we will give our translation into Russian).

"Our surnames

I. The oldest and most original Belarusian surnames:

ICH (Savinich, Bobic, Smolich, Babich, Yaremic). These surnames began to appear at that time in the life of the Belarusian people, when tribal relations took place. Those who were from the Smala clan began to be called Smolichs, from the Bob clan - Bobichs, from the Baba clan - Babichs, etc. The same endings -ich are found in the names of all the tribes that eventually formed the basis of the Belarusian people (Krivichi, Dregovichi, Radimichi).

In Belarus there are a lot of places in -ichi (Byalynichi, Ignatichi, Yaremichi), all of them are very ancient and signify the Fatherland of the clan. Surnames in -ich and localities in -ichi are found in abundance, starting from the Disnensky povet (district) of the Vilnius region. There are even more of them in the west, south and center of the Vitebsk region, and it is likely that there are quite a lot of these surnames in the east of the Vitebsk lands; they are quite often found throughout the Mogilev region, and little by little throughout the rest of Belarus. Of all the Slavs, except Belarusians, only Serbs (Pašić, Vujačić, Stojanović) have surnames ending in -ich.

HIV. Next to the names Smolich, Smaljachich, etc. there are surnames Smolevich, Klyanovich, Rodzevich, Babrovich, Zhdanovich, etc., localities Smolevichi, etc. Surnames in -ich are very ancient, but still less ancient than those already mentioned above in -ich. In the endings -ovich, -evich, the meaning of kinship also intersects with the meaning of belonging (Babr-ov-ich).

Surnames such as Petrovich, Demidovich, Vaitsyulevich, etc. show that the founders of these families were already Christians, and those like Akhmatovich - that their founders were Muslims, because Akhmat is a Muslim name. The same surnames of Belarusian Muslims, like Rodkevich, mean surnames not only with a Belarusian ending, but also with a Belarusian root (foundation), and show that the founders of these clans were Belarusians, who themselves, or their descendants, converted to Islam. Not all Rodkevichs are Muslims; some of them, such as those who live in Mensk, are of the Catholic faith. There are Jewish surnames with Belarusian -vich, but with a Jewish or German stem - Rubinovich, Rabinovich, Mavshovich. These are the surnames that arose among the Jewish population in the Belarusian environment. Surnames in -vich are common throughout Belarus; -ich and -vich make up 30-35% of all Belarusian surnames. Surnames in -vich correspond to the names of localities (villages, towns, settlements): Kutsevichi, Popelevich, Dunilovichi, Osipovichi, Klimovichi.

Surnames in -vich are sometimes called Lithuanian. This comes from the fact that the Lithuanian state once covered the entire territory of present-day Belarus. The magnification of Belarusian surnames by Lithuanian ones is the same misunderstanding in the names as Mensk-Litovsky, Berestye-Litovskoye and Kamenets-Litovsky, etc.”

I must interrupt the quote and clarify that Central and Western Belarus is the original historical Lithuania (which is completely mistakenly called Zhmud), and the “misunderstanding” appeared after 1795, when Catherine II ordered the Litvins to be called with a new name “Belarusians”, thereby creating a mess both in terms and in ideas about the history of the Grand Duchy of Belarus. But let's return to the work of a philologist.

“It sometimes happens that original and characteristic Belarusian surnames are simultaneously called Polish. There are no Poles with such surnames at all. Mickiewicz, Sienkiewicz, Kandratovich - these are Belarusians who created the wealth of Polish culture. For example, in the Benitsky volost of the Oshmyany district there are many representatives bearing the surname Mitska, and there is the village of Mitskavichi, which means the same as Mitskevichi, only in the latter version the “ts” has hardened and the emphasis has changed. If you look, for example, at the lists of friends of Polish associations in Poland, then next to typically Polish surnames and many German ones, only here and there, very rarely, can you come across a surname ending in -ich or -wich, and you can always find out that its owner is Belarusian. Surnames and common words in -wich and -ich are completely foreign in the Polish language. A word like krolewicz is Belarusianism with a “Polished” basis. In the Russian language, where surnames starting with -ich, -ovich, and -evich did not arise, the paternal name (patronymic) with these suffixes has been preserved to this day. Ukrainians have surnames in -ich, but mainly in the northern Ukrainian lands, where they could have arisen under Belarusian influence. In Ukrainian, paternal names were preserved. In the old days, Poles and Chekhs and other Slavs (for example, Lusatian Serbs) had paternal names, as evidenced by the names in -ice (Katowice), corresponding to the Belarusian in -ici (Baranovichi). The opinion about the Polish origin of these surnames arose because the Belarusian lands from 1569 until the division of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth of Both Peoples were an integral autonomous part of the entire federal (or even confederal) Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth of both Nations, but even more because apolitical Belarusian magnates (Chodkiewicz, Khrebtovichi, Valadkovichi, Vankovichi) had their own interests throughout the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.

According to the traditions of the Belarusian language, the names of dynasties in Belarusian should end in -vich. Therefore, it is correct and necessary to say: Rogvolodovich (Belarusian dynasty of Rogvolod of Polotsk), Vseslavich (Belarusian dynasty of Vseslav the Great Sorcerer), Gediminovich, Jagailovich (not Jagielon), Piastovich (Polish Piast dynasty), Arpadovich (Ugric (Hungarian) dynasty), Fatimidovich ( Egyptian Muslim dynasty), Premyslovic (Czech Premysl dynasty), but not Premyslids, which sounds awkward in Belarusian.

Surnames in -ski, -tski are local (The author here is talking about surnames in -ski, -tski. - V.D.) They appeared from the names of settlements and family estates of the nobility. Distributed among the gentry of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania since the 15th century. Belarusian nobles of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania who owned estates: Tyapina - Tyapinsky, Ostrog - Ostrozhsky, Oginty - Oginsky, Mir - Mirsky, Dostoeva - Dostoevsky, etc. According to the names of the area, those who were from Dubeykov became Dubeykovsky, those from Sukhodolu - Sukhodolsky, those who lived near the lake - Ozersky, across the river - Zaretsky, behind the forest - Zalessky, etc. Zubovsky, Dubitsky, Sosnovsky. A student who studies in Vilna will be called Vilensky, and one who studies in Prague will be called Prazhsky, etc.

As already mentioned, there are many local Belarusian surnames in -ski, -tski, so similar and new ones could have been created by analogy by the Belarusian Jews and Zhmuds.

These surnames are both old and new. Moreover, if they are old, then they usually belonged to people famous in some way, boyars or gentry. But the new surnames in -ski, -tski belong equally to all classes, peasants and even Belarusian Jews. I was told that Jews lived behind the mountain near Oshmyany; when the order came from the Russian authorities to re-register all the residents in the districts, it turned out in the office that these Jews did not have any surname, just the grandfather was called Lipka, Berk’s father, Shymel’s son, etc. They didn't know how to write them down. One Belarusian neighbor came to the rescue: “So these are the Zagorsk Jews.” That’s how they were written down: “Zagorskie”.

The surnames of Muslim shlyata in Belarus in -ski, -tski, simultaneously with the Belarusian basis (Karitsky and others), show, like surnames like Rodkevich, that these are Muslims not of the Tatar, but of the Belarusian family. But among the Belarusian Tatars there are many surnames in -ski, -tski and with a Tatar base (Konopatsky, Yasinsky).

Surnames in -ski, -tski correspond to the Belarusian names of settlements in -shchina (Skakovshchina, Kazorovshchina). About 12% of Belarusians have surnames in -ski, -tski.

Surnames in -ski, -tski, created from the names of settlements, are found among all Slavic peoples. So, in addition to the Belarusians, the Poles (Dmovski), the Chekhs (Dobrovsky), the Ukrainians (Grushevsky), as well as the Serbs, Bulgarians and Muscovites.

Such surnames in -ski, -tski, as Uspensky, Bogorodensky, Arkhangelsky, are of church origin and can equally be found among all Orthodox Slavs.

When surnames starting with -ich, -vich mean gender, then surnames starting with -onok, -enok (Yulyuchenok, Lizachenok, Artsemenok), -chik, -ik (Martinenok, Alekseychik, Ivanchik, Yazepchik, Avgunchik, Mironchik, Syamenik), -uk , -yuk (Kukharchik, Mikhalyuk, Alyaksyuk, Vasilyuk) - mean a son (son of Yazep or son of Yavgeny), and the surname in -enya (Vasilenya) generally means a child (Vasil’s child). Surnames with -onok, -enok, -enya, -chyk, -ik are characteristic Belarusian and common among Belarusians, although not as old as -ich and -vich. Only Belarusians have surnames ending in -onok. Belarusian surnames with -onok, -enok correspond to Ukrainian surnames with -enko (Cherkasenko, Demidenko), and in Swedish and English surnames with -son (son), and surnames with -enya correspond to Georgian ones with endings with -shvili (Remashvili) .

Surnames in -onok, -enok, -enya, -chyk, -ik, -uk, -yuk in Belarus make up 25-35%, which means approximately the same as in -ich and -vich. Surnames ending in -onok and -enok are more common in the Vilna region, even more so in the Vitebsk region, less so in the Mogilev region and the western part of the Menshchina. There are them all over Belarus. Surnames starting with -chik and -ik are scattered throughout Belarus. On -enya, -uk, -yuk - more in the Grodno region.”

REQUIRED PAUSE

Here, probably, it is necessary to make some logical pause in citing the research of Yanka Stankevich, since further he considers the issue of Russian influence on Belarusian surnames.

It seems to me that Yanka Stankevich missed a circumstance that is very important from the point of view of linguistics, that surnames in -ko and their derivatives in different forms are the same endings -ov or -ev, modified in local traditions, meaning belonging. Among some Belarusians, this was truncated to -au, -eu in the current language (similar to the toponyms Pilau or Breslau - the cities of the Polabian Slavs captured by the Germans), and earlier this was reflected in the Baltic-Slavic toponyms in -o (original -ov): Grodno, Vilno, Rivne, Drezno, Kovno, Gniezno, etc., where phonetically it clearly sounded like “Dreznou” or “Rovnou”. That is, with the same -ov. (And more precisely - Vilnau or Grodnau, which in the Middle Ages then became known to us as simply Vilna and Grodna, reflecting the Belarusian language - a mixture of the Akane language of the Western Balts with the local Slavs Krivichi - also exactly the same previously Slavicized Balts). Likewise, surnames in -ko are only modified -kov, where “v” first reached the Belarusian or Serbian-Lusatian “u”, and then lost this phonetic sign. In this understanding, surnames starting with -onok, -enok are only abbreviated by local phonetic tradition from -onki, -enki. And all surnames in -ko are just a variation of surnames in -kov.

It seems incorrect to clearly differentiate surnames with -ko in Belarus and Western Ukraine, which were characterized by a reduction of such an ending, from the Russian -kov. Formally, these are the same surnames, but with varying degrees of deafening of the last consonant sound. From a linguistic point of view, this is just an insignificant difference. However, many linguists - both ours and Russia - did not see anything in common in -ko and -kov, did not see that this was the same relationship of belonging to something. For example, the surname of the President of Ukraine centuries ago should have sounded like Yushchenkau - in the phonetics of the people, which actually meant Yushchenkov. This -ау or -ов was lost (or found by others, which is the same) in the course of the local development of national Slavic content. Likewise, all Belarusians with surnames ending in -ko have surnames that previously sounded like -kau. And there are a lot of these names.

The question is so important that many Belarusians with surnames ending in -ko ask: are they Belarusians or Ukrainians? They are, of course, Belarusians, especially since purely statistically there are too many of these surnames for them to be unusual for Belarus. Yanka Stankevich also thinks so, but he further clearly says that “All the Belarusian surnames have been changed to -ko from Belarusian surnames to -onak, -enak.” I don’t quite agree with this.

RUSSIAN INFLUENCE

Let's return to the work of Yanka Stankevich. 10-12% of surnames are formed from nicknames (Beaver, Busel, etc.), and then he writes:

“Surnames with endings in -ov, -ev, -in are found among Belarusians in the east and south of the Vitebsk region, in the east of the Mogilev region, and are quite common in the Smolensk region and in the Belarusian parts of other provinces (Pskov, Tver, etc.). They can also be found in some places in western Belarus. The question arises how these surnames, characteristic of Muscovites and Bulgarians, could appear among Belarusians.

First, you need to pay attention to the fact that these Belarusian lands were under Moscow rule for a long time (about 145 years, and some for 300-400 years). And that being under the Moscow region, they were controlled not autonomously, but from the Moscow center. Already in the ancient times of Moscow power in these Belarusian lands, Muscovites, not respecting the characteristics of the Belarusian people, did not respect special Belarusian surnames, changing them into their usual ones with endings in -ov, -ev, -in.

It’s interesting that when our book printer Fedorovich came to Moscow, they called him “Fedorov.” (I must explain that the Moscow first printer “Fedorov” is our nobleman, Litvin (Belarusian) from Baranovichi Fedorovich (emphasis on the second “o”), and his surname was changed in Ivan the Terrible’s Muscovy for the reason that in our country -ich meant clan relations, and in Muscovy, which was created on the land of the Finns and did not have ancient Slavic roots, -ich was a sign of special aristocracy, and was distributed by the sovereign only to selected aristocrats; more about this below in my commentary. - V.D.)

Just as the surname Fedorovich was changed in Moscow, so were a lot of other Belarusian surnames changed in the Belarusian lands dependent on the Moscow region. Therefore, the Belarusians of these lands had two surnames at the same time - one their own, the other - which the authorities knew. That is, they were “called” by one name, but “written” by a different surname. Over time, however, these latter written surnames took over. So the Boresevichs became the Borisovs, the Trofimovichs became the Trofimovs, etc. But where a family tradition was associated with the old native surname, it was preserved, and these national Belarusian surnames have survived even to this day in the most remote corners of the ethnic territory of the Belarusians.

...One should not be surprised that the Muscovites moscowized some of the Belarusian surnames, when even peoples so distant from the Muscovites by language (not by blood), like the Chuvash and Kazan Tatars, they moscowed all the surnames. ...The Chuvash, who recently adopted the Orthodox faith, have all Moscow surnames due to the fact that they were baptized in masses and for some reason more often gave the name Vasily or Maxim - so now the majority of Chuvash have the surnames Vasiliev or Maximov.

...With the expansion of the Ukrainian movement, Ukrainian surnames with -enko acquired the right of citizenship from the Russian authorities, including the Belarusian royal volost clerks, who also began to consider them “correct” (following the Moscow surnames). These clerks, changing some Belarusian surnames to Moscow s -ov, -ev, -in, at the same time changed others to -ko, depending on what “was closer.” So from Tsiareshka’s son, Tsiareshchanok (Tsiareshchanok abo Tsiareshchonak) became Tereshchenko; from Zmitronak - Zmitrenko (or even more “correctly” - Dmitrienko), from Zhaўtok - Zheltko. All Belarusian surnames have been changed to -ko from Belarusian surnames to -onak, -enak.

...Summarizing everything that has been said about surnames with -ov, -ev, -in, it should be said briefly that these surnames became: 1) the result of alteration or replacement of Belarusian surnames by Moscow clerks and bosses; 2) some Belarusians have recently changed them into fashionable Moscow ones; 3) they could partly appear in the Belarusian environment - under Moscow influence.

These surnames are all new and are not typical for Belarusians. Belarusians have 15-20% of these surnames. Surnames with -ov, -ev, -in are national for Bulgarians and Muscovites. Ukrainians also have approximately the same number of these surnames as Belarusians, where they have the same character as ours.”

NOBLERY FAMILIES OF BELARUS

About a million Belarusians today have surnames in -Sky. And about a third of these surnames are noble, while the share of noble among surnames with other endings is negligible. Why is that?

Here it should be remembered that noble surnames, for example, Germans and French, are easily recognizable, they include de or von. The Slavs also have an analogue: these are surnames in -Sky. The story began in Poland and Moravia - the oldest Slavic states, which for the first time secured the Western status of the nobility among the Slavs. There, the noble surname initially came from the name of the land ownership, with the preposition added z(corresponding to de or von) - i.e. "from". For example: Swjatopolk z Borowa (“z” here was a “sign of nobility”, part of the surname). But since the Slavic languages (except for analytical Bulgarian) are languages with strong synthetic properties, over time the preposition began to be replaced by an ending in -ski. And the surname “z Borowa” began to sound like Zborovsky or more often just Borovsky. For example, in pre-German Silesia, the owner of Mitrova was called Mitrovich, but when he built a new castle and named it after his last name - Mitrovich, a new one in -ski was added to his previous surname, and his descendants were already called Mitrovich-Mitrovski. In Silesia, Moravia, Saxony, where the now Germanized Slavs once lived, there are many towns, castles, villages ending in -ich or, in the German adaptation, in -itz (and last names too).

By the way, about the name Stirlitz. My colleague, who often visited Germany, was told by the Germans that this surname sounded “typically German,” but none of the Germans knew what it meant. This is not surprising, since this is a reworking of a Slavic surname in a German manner, and initially the surname Stirlitz should have sounded like Shtyrlich - and belonged to the Lusatian Serbs. Whether Yulian Semyonov consciously gave his character a Germanized Serbian surname or not - the writer died without revealing this secret.

As for Muscovy, there Slavic noble surnames in -skiy came into use extremely late, since real feudalism was not “instilled” in Moscow due to the influence of the Horde, and in the appanage period even the prince-rulers of Pereyaslavl, Yaroslavl, Rostov could not to retain this nickname due to the frequent change of destinies.

Muscovy developed its own special unique form of giving a surname aristocratic status. Linguists write:

“In the pre-Moscow period in Rus', the inversion of one’s own name or nickname was accomplished by adding the ending -ich to the first. In Muscovy, such an order was destroyed, including due to the humiliation of one person in front of another, who was considered superior (consequences of localism). Family nicknames in ancient Rus' in the form of a full patronymic in -ich were an expression of respect and honor. In Muscovy, -ich was truncated to give the nickname a diminutive and derogatory form. Moreover, the great princes continued to “victimize” themselves, as well as their relatives and those persons who enjoyed their special favor. Slaves "victimized" the masters, ordinary people - noble people.

In Moscow letters, “-vich” was added as a sign of honor to foreign names. The Radziwills were called Radziwillovichs, similarly to Sapegas and Dovgerds. However, with those who were treated without fear, they did not stand on ceremony. Examples of this are comments to Hetman Khmelnitsky, who used his patronymic with “-vich”. Hetman Samoilovich was cut down to Samoilov, and the same was done with the Mokrievichs, Domontovichs, Yakubovichs, Mikhneviches - and the result was the Mokrievs, Domontovs, Yakubovs, Mikhnevs. (Let’s add here an example of the conversion of the Moscow pioneer Fedorovich to “Fedorov.” - V.D.)

Surnames with -vich existed for a long time in Novgorod and Pskov (where there were boyar surnames - Stroilovichi, Kazachkovichi, Doinikovichi, Raigulovichi, Ledovichi, Lyushkovichi), which turned into truncated ones under Moscow influence.

The ending -ich was reversed at the end of the 16th century. as a special extraordinary reward, the sovereign of Muscovy himself indicated who should be written with “-vich”. During the reign of Catherine II, a list of very few persons was compiled who should be written with “-vich” in government papers. When the question arose of how to deal with patronymics in this case, the Empress ordered: persons of the first 5 classes should be written with a full patronymic, persons from the 6th to the 8th inclusive - with half patronymics (without "-ich"), and all others - without patronymic, only by first name.”

It should also be recalled that even according to the norms of Nicholas II, already at the beginning of the twentieth century, in Tsarist Russia patronymics in -ich were written only for the “Russian people” (which then included the Great Russians, Little Russians and Belarusians), but for other peoples the patronymic written in -ov. For example, in Stalin’s royal passport it was written: Joseph Vissarionov Dzhugashvili. Stalin gained his identity only after the October revolution. Another detail: in Tsarist Russia, the Cossacks were not considered “Russian people”, but were considered (quite rightly) a non-Russian people, and in their passports, like the Georgian Dzhugashvili, patronymics were written not in -ich, but in -ov. Such a royal Cossack passport was cited by the Russian magazine “Rodina”: Nikolai Semenov Bashkurov, in the nationality column - Cossack. The Don Cossacks of Russia are ethnically Cherkasy (the capital of the Don Cossack Army is Novocherkassk). Other Cossack troops of Russia are of other ethnic groups (Tatars, Kipchaks, etc. Russian-speaking Turkic peoples), all are not Slavs.

Linguists note that a “big surname” does not always indicate nobility of origin. Often such surnames can be found among the peasantry; released serfs took the surname of their masters, especially if these surnames were generally known. An example from our time is the first cosmonaut Yu. Gagarin - a descendant of the serfs of one of the Gagarin princes.

BALTIC BELARUS

In the work of Yanka Stankevich there is one, but significant, in my opinion, drawback. He, it seems, has become to a certain extent hostage to the myth that Belarusians are purebred Slavs. This myth was born in Tsarist Russia regarding its ethnic group of Slavicized Finns and automatically, as it were, spread to the Belarusians. The trouble is that this myth undermines the very understanding of the essence of the Belarusian ethnic group within the framework of its “Muscovization”, because Belarusians are not some kind of “Eastern Slavs”, but Baltic Slavs. There are two ethnic groups in the group of Baltic Slavs - Belarusians and Poles; Poland is 60%, and Belarus is 80% ethnically composed of Slavicized Western Balts, the original inhabitants of Belarus and Poland. This is what makes them fundamentally different from all other Slavs. The only ethnic “islands of Slavism” in our two countries can be considered the historical Poland of the Poles (Southern Poland with its capital in Krakow, a smaller part of the current territory of Poland) - and the Polotsk State of the Krivichi.

Moreover, I would even clarify this: Poles and Belarusians are ethnically more Western Balts than Slavs. Not only because they, one of the Slavs, “strangely” distorted the Slavic language to a great extent with pshekan and dzekan, actually adopting the ethnic composition of the Western Balts. But in terms of the mentality of the ethnic group, it is not the Slavic that prevails, but their own special Western Baltic component. Within the framework of which they united in 1569 into the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, although other Slavic peoples (Czechs, Slovaks, Ukrainians) did not show much zeal here, because they did not have this very Western Baltic component. But this is a different topic - the topic of the mentality of our peoples.

The most famous Belarusian actress Irina Mazurkevich (films “How Tsar Peter Married the Blackamoor”, “Three in a Boat, Not Counting the Dog”, “Squadron of Flying Hussars” and many others), whose family I was closely acquainted with in Minsk since 1970- x, once in a conversation with me she remarked: “Did our last name really come from the word “mazurik” - that is, from a corpse? In Leningrad [where she worked in the theater] they try to call me “Mazurik,” to which I make a scary face in response.”

Of course, mazurik and mazur are different things, only similar in sound. In Belarus, tens of thousands of families from time immemorial bore the surnames Mazurkevich, Mazur, Mazurov, etc., including the leaders of the Communist Party of Belarus. All these surnames came, of course, not from the Russian word “Mazurik”, but from the great ethnic group of the Western Balts, the Masurians, who lived in the territory of what is now Poland and Belarus. This was indeed once a great ethnic group, which had its own statehood in the form of the country of Mazovia and the great princes of the Mazovians (Masurians), but then by the 16th century it was completely Slavicized in the Polish and Lithuanian (then Belarusian) environment.

The story of the Prussians, Dainovs, Yatvingians and other Western Balts, who once inhabited the entire Western and Central Belarus, but were first assimilated into the Russian-speaking Slavic ethnic group of Litvins (which became Lithuania), and then forcibly adopted the name “Belarusians”, is similar. Although islands of the Western Balts’ identity are still scattered throughout the West of Belarus, and we have talked about this in a number of publications.

When Catherine II in the 18th century took up the occupation of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in “three sections”, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania-Belarus then consisted of two halves - White Rus' as the territory of the Krivichi, the Western Balts Slavicized until the 10th century (Vitebsk, Mogilev, Smolensk, Bryansk, Kursk - the latter were already captured by Russia) and Black Rus' or Lithuania as territories with a more visible Western Balt ethnic expression. Lithuania (Black Rus') is Minsk, Vilna, Gomel, Pinsk, Grodno, Brest, etc., including all of Polesie. In this territory, even during surveys in 1953, villagers called themselves not “Belarusians,” but “Litvins.”

When in 1772 Catherine captured our Vitebsk, Orsha, Mogilev and Gomel, the population of these cities traditionally called themselves only Litvins (the term “White Rus'” was absolutely not a state term, dubious from a historical and ethnic point of view, since it concerned only the aspect the Krivichi ethnic group, significant in the past, but long ago blurred by this time - just as similar ethnic groups of the Drevlyans or Northerners were blurred). But the queen ordered the advisers to find a name for the new lands that would mentally separate them from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. They proposed the term “Belarusians”.

All this would have remained a temporary invention of tsarism, but Russia was lucky enough to capture the entire Grand Duchy of Lithuania in 1793-95. Catherine did not invent anything new and ordered that all of Lithuania with its Litvins be renamed “White Rus'”, although it was precisely Black Russia (the synonym for which is Lithuania). Which is far from science and any logic.

As a result, now, in 2006, we live in a state called Belarus, which strictly scientifically is not any “Belarus”: only two of its six regions of the state belong to historical Belarus - Vitebsk and Mogilev. The rest are Chernarus or Lithuania, and the Chernarus-Litvins themselves make up about 80% of the population in the country. As the Russian historian Soloviev wrote, “scratch a Russian - there will be a Tatar under him,” and so about us: dig a Belarusian - there will be Litvin and Lithuania in him.

At the same time, I would definitely like to clarify that our Baltic component is a component of the Western Balts, and not the Eastern ones. The Western Balts (Prussians, Pomors, Yatvingians, Masurians, Dainova, etc.) differed so little in language and culture from the Slavs that they completely disappeared into their midst half a thousand years ago (for the Slavs descended from the Western Balts). But the eastern Balts (now Lietuva and Latvia) were very different from both the Western Slavs and the Western Balts - that is why they retained their national identity. The Western Balts in all their content were much closer to the Slavs than the Eastern Balts.

Not knowing this deep historical connection of ours with the Western Balts, from which we all came, other historians of the USSR school consider the names of the princes of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania supposedly “not Belarusian” and “alien”: Jagiello, Vitovt, Viten, etc. They are trying to attribute them to the ethnic group of the Zhmuds and Aukshtaits Lietuvas - that is, the ethnic group of the Eastern Balts, who NEVER HAD such names in history, just as they do not exist today. In fact, these are the names of our central and western Belarusians, who, apart from the territory of present-day Belarus (and also Poland), did not exist anywhere in history and correspond only to the names of the Western Baltic peoples of the Prussians, Dainovs, Yatvingians, Masurians, etc., who lived on our territory.

This issue was studied in detail by the famous Belarusian historian Vitovt Charopka in the book “Name in the Chronicle”, where he points out that these are OUR historical Slavic-Western Baltic names, from the territory of present-day Belarus and only: “Zhyvinbud, Vilikail, Vishymut, Kincibout, Boutavit, Kitseniy, Praise, Logveniy, Low, Alekhna, Danuta, Budzikid, Budzivid, Slauka, Nyamir, Nyalyub, Lyalush, Borza, Les, Lesiy, Serputiy, Troydzen, Ruklya, Voishalk, Tranyata, Lyubim, Lyubka, Lyutaver, Vitsen, Warrior, Nyazhyla, Kumets, Kruglec, Golsha, Jogaila, Rapenya, Sirvid, Polyush, Spud, Gerdzen, Botavit, Fedar, Volchka, Lisitsa, Kazleika.”

All these are OUR names, which our common people bore everywhere (everywhere throughout present-day Central and Western Belarus). These names were borne, among other things, by our princes of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and their governors and other associates. It is a misconception to believe that “these are supposedly alien names to us,” when in the Middle Ages among Belarusians some of the most common names among the people were Voishalk, Tranyata, Viten, Jogaila - the names of the princes of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. These are our folk names for us as Western Balts. Yes, they have sunk into oblivion, just as our ethnic group of Western Balts has sunk into oblivion, we have become Slavs.

But our surnames have preserved this memory. The list of the most popular folk names of the medieval Grand Duchy of Lithuania given by Vitovt Charopka is very indicative. No one has given such names to our children for a long time, but as surnames (in their Western Baltic derivatives) they have been preserved by a huge part of today’s Belarusians. Unfortunately, Yanka Stankevich’s large-scale work on Belarusian surnames concerned only the analysis of their lexical texture (endings), and only in passing - semantics in its ethnic origins. The origins of the Western Balt ethnic groups in the formation of primordial Belarusian surnames is an untouched topic for linguistic research.

Vasil_s-pad_Wilni

Our surnames
Jan Stankevich. The article was written in 1922 and published in No. 4 of the Belarusian News magazine in August-September 1922.

I. The oldest and most original Belarusian surnames:
-ICH (Savinich, Bobic, Smolich, Babich, Yaremic). These surnames began to appear at that time in the life of the Belarusian people, when tribal relations took place. Those who were from the Smala clan began to be called Smolichs, from the Baba (Bob) clan - Bobichs, from the Baba clan - Babichs, etc. The same endings - ich are present in the names of all the tribes that over time formed the basis of the Belarusian people (Krivichi, Dregovichi, Radimichi).

In Belarus there are a lot of places in –ichi (Byalynichi, Ignatichi, Yaremichi), all of them are very ancient and signify the Fatherland of the clan. Surnames with - ich and localities with - ichi are found in abundance, starting from the Disnensk povet (district) of the Vilnius region. There are even more of them in the west, south and center of the Vitebsk region, and it is likely that there are quite a lot of these surnames in the east of the Vitebsk lands; they are quite often found throughout the Mogilev region, and little by little throughout the rest of Belarus.
Of all the Slavs, besides the Belarusians, only Serbs (Pašić, Vujačić, Stojanović) have surnames ending in –ich.

HIV. Next to the names Smolich, Smaljachich, etc. there are surnames Smolevich, Klyanovich, Rodzevich, Babrovich, Zhdanovich, etc., localities Smolevichi, etc. Surnames in –vich are very ancient, but still less ancient than those already mentioned above in –ich. In the endings –ovich, -evich, the meaning of kinship also intersects with the meaning of belonging (Babr-ov-ich).

Surnames such as Petrovich, Demidovich, Vaitsyulevich, etc. show that the founders of these families were already Christians, and those like Akhmatovich - that their founders were Muslims, because Akhmat is a Muslim name. The same surnames of Belarusian Muslims, like Rodkevich, mean surnames not only with a Belarusian ending, but also with a Belarusian root (foundation), and show that the founders of these families were Belarusians, who themselves or their descendants converted to Islam. Not all Rodkevichs are Muslims; some of them, like, for example, those who live in Mensk (now Minsk, my note), are of the Catholic faith. There are Jewish surnames with Belarusian surnames -vich, but with a Jewish or German stem - Rubinovich, Rabinovich, Mavshovich. These are the surnames that arose among the Jewish population in the Belarusian environment.
Surnames ending in –vich are common throughout Belarus; - ich and –vich make up 30-35% of all Belarusian surnames. Surnames in –vich correspond to the names of localities (villages, towns, settlements): Kutsevichi, Popelevich, Dunilovichi, Osipovichi, Klimovichi.

Surnames ending in -vich are sometimes called Lithuanian. This came about because the Lithuanian state once covered the entire territory of present-day Belarus.
It sometimes happens that original and characteristic Belarusian surnames are simultaneously called Polish. There are no Poles with such surnames at all. Mickiewicz, Sienkiewicz, Kandratovich - these are Belarusians who created the wealth of Polish culture. For example, in the Benitsky volost of the Oshmyany district there are many representatives bearing the surname Mitska and there is the village of Mitskavichi, which means the same as Mitskevichi, but in the latest version the “ts” has hardened and the emphasis has changed. If you look, for example, at the lists of friends of Polish associations in Poland, then next to typical Polish surnames and many German ones, only in some places, very rarely, you can find a surname ending in -ich or -wich, and you can always find out that its owner is Belarusian. Surnames and common words in –wich and –ich are completely foreign in the Polish language. A word like krolewicz is Belarusianism with a “Polished” basis. In the Russian language, where surnames with -ich, -ovich, -evich did not arise, the name after the father (patronymic) with these suffixes has been preserved to this day. Ukrainians have surnames with -ich, but mainly in the northern Ukrainian lands, where they could have arisen under Belarusian influence. In Ukrainian, paternal names were preserved. In the old days, the Poles and Chekhs and other Slavs (for example, the Lusatian Serbs) had paternal names, as evidenced by the names in –ice (Katowice), corresponding to the Belarusian in –ici (Baranovichi). The opinion about the Polish origin of these surnames arose because the Belarusian lands from 1569 until the division of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth of Both Nations were an integral autonomous part of the entire federal (or even confederal) Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth of both Nations, but even more because apolitical Belarusian magnates (Chodkiewicz, Khrebtovichi, Valadkovichi, Vankovichi) had their own interests throughout the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.

II. Last names on
–SKY, -TSKY local. They arose from the names of localities and names of family estates of the gentry. They have been widespread among the Belarusian gentry of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania since the 15th century. The Belarusian nobleman of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, who owned the Tsyapin estate, was called Tsyapinsky, Ostrog - Ostrogsky, Oginty - Oginsky, Mir - Mirsky, Dostoev - Dostoevsky, etc. According to the names of the places, those who were from Dubeykovo became Dubeykovsky, those from Sukhodol became Sukhodolsky, those who lived near the lake became Ozersky, across the river became Zaretsky, behind the forest - Zalesky, etc. Zubovsky, Dubitsky, Sosnovsky. A student who studies in Vilnius will be called Vilensky, and one who studies in Prague will be called Prazhsky, etc.

Among the already emerging multitude of local Belarusian surnames in –skiy, -tskiy, similar or new surnames could arise by analogy with the Belarusian Jews and Zhamoits.

These surnames are both old and new. Moreover, in the case of the old one, they probably belonged to fairly famous people, that is, boyars, or gentry. But the new surnames in –sky, -tsky belong equally to all classes, villagers and even Belarusian Jews. One gentleman told me the following incident: Near the village of Oshmyany, behind the mountain, Jews lived; When the Russian authorities issued a decree to write down all residents on the lists, it turned out in the office that these Jews did not have any surname, their grandfather was simply nicknamed Lipka, Berka’s father, Shimel’s son, etc. They didn't know how to write them down. One neighbor, Belarus, who happened to be nearby, came to the rescue: “So these are the Zagorsk Jews,” he says. This is how the Zagorskis recorded them.

The surnames of the Muslim gentry in Belarus in –sky, -tsky, simultaneously with the Belarusian basis (Karitsky and others), show, like surnames like Rodkevich, that these Muslims are not of the Tatar, but of the Belarusian family. But among the Belarusian Tatars there are also many surnames with –skiy, -tskiy and with a Tatar base (Kanapatskiy, Yasinskiy).

Surnames in –skiy and -tskiy correspond to the Belarusian names of localities in –shchina (Skakavshchina, Kazarovschina). Surnames in –skiy and -tskiy make up about 12% of Belarusians.

Surnames in –skiy, -tskiy, as derivatives of localities, are found among all Slavic peoples. So, in addition to the Belarusians, the Poles (Dmovski), the Chekhs (Dobrovsky), the Ukrainians (Grushevsky), as well as the Serbs, Bulgarians and Muscovites (Russians, my note).

Such surnames in -sky, -tsky, as Uspensky, Bogoroditsky, Arkhangelsky, are of church origin and can be equally common among all Orthodox Slavs.

III. When surnames with –ich, -vich denote gender, surnames with –onok, -yonok (Yuluchonok, Lazichonok, Artyamenok), -chik, -ik (Marcinchik, Alyakseichik, Ivanchik, Yazepchik, Avginchik, Mironchik, Mlynarchik, Syamenik, Kuharchik) , -uk, -yuk (Mikhalyuk, Aleksyuk, Vasilyuk) designate a son (the son of Yazep or the son of Avgini, or the son of Mlynar), and surnames with –enya (Vaselenya) are simply a child (Vasil’s child). Surnames with –onak, -yonak, -enya, -chik, -ik are characteristic Belarusian and common among Belarusians, although not as ancient as those with –ich and –vich. Only Belarusians have surnames ending in -onak and -yonak. Belarusian surnames ending in –onak, -yonak correspond to Ukrainian surnames ending in –enko (Cherkasenko, Demidenko), and in Swedish and English surnames ending in –son (son), and surnames in –enya correspond to Georgian ones ending in –shvili (Remashvili) .

There are 25-35% of surnames in Belarus with –onak, -yonak, -enya, -chik, -ik, -uk, -yuk, which means approximately as many as with –ich and –vich.

Surnames in -onak, -yonak are most common in the Disna povet of the Vilna region, even more in the Vitebsk region, perhaps a little less in the Mogilev region and in the eastern part of the Menshchina. There are them all over Belarus.

Surnames ending in -chik and -ik are also scattered throughout Belarus.
On –enya, -uk, -yuk – most of all in the Grodno region

IV. Then there are surnames that come from various names (Tooth, Book, Kacharga, Tambourine, Sak, Shyshka, Shyla), plants (Cabbage, Redzka, Burak, Gichan, Mushroom, Pear, Bulba, Tsybulya), birds (Verabey, Busel, Batsyan, Saroka, Gil, Tit, Shulyak, Karshun, Kite, Kazhan, Voran, Kruk, Shpak, Chyzh, Golub, Galubok), animals (Karovka, Hare, Beaver, Miadzvedz, Fox, Korsak), names of the month or day of the week ( Listapad, Serada, Vechar), holidays (Vyalikdzen, Kalyada, Kupala), people's names became surnames (Syargei, Barys, Gardzei, Mitska, Tamash, Zakharka, Kastsyushka, Manyushka, Myaleshka). This also includes surnames that characterize a person. So on - ka, -ька at the heart of the words Parotska, Lyanutska (one who is lazy), Zabudzka (one who forgets himself), there are also surnames: Budzka (who wakes up), Sapotska (who snores), then Rodzka (from giving birth), Khodzka (from walk), Khotska (from want), Zhylka, Dubovka, Brovka and a lot of similar surnames.

These surnames, both old (Wolf, Toad, Kishka, Korsak), and new, are found throughout Belarus; there will be about 10-12% of all Belarusian surnames.

V. Surnames with endings in -ov, -ev, -in are found among Belarusians, starting from the east and north of the Vitebsk region, from the east of the Mogilev region; there are quite a few such surnames in the Smolensk region and in the Belarusian parts of other provinces (Pskov, Tverskaya, etc..). In some places they can be found in the center and west of Belarus. The question arises as to how such surnames, characteristic of the Muscovites (i.e., Russians) and Bolgars, could have arisen among the Belarusians.

First of all, you need to keep in mind that these Belarusian lands for a long time (about 145 years, and some for 300-400 years) were part of Russia, that, being under Russian rule, they were governed not as autonomy, but from the center Russian state. One must think that already in the ancient times of Muscovite domination on these Belarusian lands, without observing other features of the Belarusian lands and people, the Muscovites did not observe the features of Belarusian surnames, remaking them into their own template ones with endings in -ov, -ev, -in.

It’s interesting that when our printer Fedarovich appeared in Moscow, he was called Fedorov. Just as the surname Fedarovich was changed in Moscow, so were a lot of other Belarusian surnames changed in the Belarusian lands dependent on Muscovy. Thus, the Belarusians of these lands sometimes had two surnames - one that they themselves used, the other - which the authorities knew. Speaking, they were “called” by one surname, and “spelled” by another surname. Over time, however, these last “correctly” spelled names took over. Their owners, for their own interests, decided to remember these written names. Thus, the Barysevichs became the Borisovs, the Trakhimovichs - the Trokhimovs, the Saprankis - the Saprankovs, etc. But where a family tradition was associated with the old native surname, it was stubbornly maintained, and such national Belarusian surnames have survived to this day on the remote borders of the ethnic territory of the Belarusians.

However, the greatest destruction of Belarusian surnames in eastern Belarus occurred in the 19th century and ended in the 20th century.

Systematically Russifying Belarus, the government systematically Russified Belarusian surnames.

It should not be surprising that the Russians Russified some of the Belarusian surnames, when even such distant peoples for Russians by language (not by blood) as the Chuvash and Kazan Tatars, they Russified all surnames. Because the Tatars are Muslims, their surnames at least have Muslim-Tatar roots (Baleev, Yamanov, Akhmadyanov, Khabibulin, Khairulin). The Chuvash, who were recently baptized into the Orthodox faith, all have purely Russian surnames, due to the fact that they were baptized en masse and for some reason most often they were given the names Vasily or Maxim, so now the majority of Chuvash have the surnames Vasiliev or Maximov. These Vasilyevs and Maximovs are often simply a disaster; there are so many of them that it can be difficult to sort them out.

The Russification of Belarusian surnames occurred both by law and simply as a result of the administrative and educational policies of the Moscow authorities in Belarus. Thus, in the volosts, in accordance with the law, entire masses of Belarusian surnames were changed to Russian ones, but in the same volosts such a change was made without any laws. Some tsar's volost clerk (or other authorities), although he knew various Belarusian surnames well, but identified these surnames as bad in their sound in the Belarusian language, and since he had to write in Russian “correctly”, he corrected them whenever possible our surnames, writing them “correctly” in Russian. He did this, often of his own free will.

With the expansion of the Ukrainian movement, Ukrainian surnames with –enko established themselves among the Russian authorities, and following this example, among the Belarusian royal volost clerks and other civil servants, they began to be considered “correct.” And the same volost clerks, changing some Belarusian surnames to Russian ones with -ov, -ev, -in, at the same time changed others to -ko, depending on which was closer. So the son of Tsiareshka, Tsiareshchanka (Tsiareshchanok or Tsiareshchonak) became Tereshchenko; z Zmitronak - Zmitrenko (or more correctly - Dmitrienko), and Zhautok - Zheltko. All Belarusian surnames in –ko have been converted from Belarusian surnames into –onak, -yonak. It happens that there is a trick hidden here - everyone’s name is, for example, Dudaronak or Zhautok, but the authorities write it down “correctly”: Dudarenko, Zheltko.

As everything foreign became fashionable in our country, and our own began to decline, some Belarusians themselves, on their own initiative, changed their surnames to fashionable, foreign, “lordly” ones. These replacements especially affected the names indicated in paragraph IV, i.e. surnames from the names of different words, birds, animals, etc. They noticed that it was not good to be called Sakol, Salavey, Sinitsa, Saroka, Gardzey and changed them to Sokolov, Sinitsyn, Solovyov, Gordeev, and Sakalenak to Sokolenko or generally made them meaningless; so Grusha began to write his surname Grusho, Farbotka - Forbotko, Murashka - Murashko, Varonka - Voronko, Khotska - Khotsko, Khodzka - Khodzko, some Shyly began to write their surname with two “l” - Shyllo, etc. They also changed their surnames to surnames with endings in -sky, which are not necessarily Belarusian, but are also found among other Slavs. As an example, I will present the following to this. I knew one gentleman whose last name was Viduk (a type of poppy with large crowns of petals, it blooms in red). Having become rich, he bought himself papers of the nobility and submitted a request to the authorities to change his surname Viduk to Makovsky. His request was granted and his last name was replaced with a double one - Viduk-Makovsky.

When surnames with –ich, -vich designate a clan, with –onak, -yonak – a son, then surnames with –ov, -ev, -in indicate affiliation, these are “objects” that answer the question whose. Whose are you? – Ilyin, Drozdov, etc. These “items” are owned not only by Russians and Bulgarians, but also by all other Slavs (Poles, Czechs, Ukrainians, Serbs). Belarusians also have them. We often say Yanuk Lyavonav, Ganka Lyavonav, Pyatruk Adamav, etc., where the words Lyavonav, Adamav mean that he comes from Lyavon, Adam, often the son or daughter of Lyavon, etc.

The affiliation of the item has to be used for separation, often Yanuk, Pyatruk, etc. there is more than one. Under Russian influence, we could have our own Belarusian surnames with such endings. In this sense, the difference between Russians and Bulgarians, on the one hand, and other Slavs, on the other, is that among the latter these items often do not become surnames.

Summarizing everything that has been said about surnames with -ov, -ev, -in, I must say briefly that these surnames arose:
1) as a result of alteration or replacement by “Moscow” clerks and bosses of Belarusian families,
2) some Belarusians have recently independently converted them to the then fashionable Russian and
3) they could partly arise in the Belarusian environment, or under Russian influence.
These surnames are all new and are not typical for Belarusians. Belarusians have 15-20% of these surnames. Surnames with -ov, -ev, -in are national among Bulgarians and Russians. About as many of these surnames as Belarusians have, Ukrainians also have, where they have the same character as ours.

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