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1. First some common Latvian names with close variants in the form of
double names or in the form of existing variants
Bērzītis-Bērziņš - Bērziņš.
Liepiņš also Liepa - Liepa
Putns also Putniņš - Putniņš
Gailis-Gailītis - Gailītis
Daboliņš also Dabols - Daboliņš. The modern spelling
of the name is Dāboliņš.
2. Now some variants of which the holder chose one. The origin of the
variants is quite frequently obscure.
Graudiņš also Grauziņš - Graudiņš.
Grauziņš really could be a spoiled form of the name Graudiņš. The latter
name is coined of the word grauds that means
- a grain, the name Grauziņš sounds as coined of the verb grauzt
- to gnaw. A name similar to the both variants of the above name
also exists - Grauzdiņš that is of quite different origin - quite
possibly it stems from the Lithuanian word grauzdus that means
rude, angry.
Lācis called Lādzēns - Lādzēns.
His initial name Lācis (means bear) is very popular in Latvia.
The name Lādzēns has no clear meaning.
Zeltainis also Zeltiņš - Zeltiņš.
The both forms are coined from the word zelts
(gold), but the form Zeltiņš is much more common.
Bukins, Buhils, Buchovickis - Bukins.
It seems that the three variants of his name were created in bureaucratic
jungles. The names have no evident meaning in Latvian and most probably
came from Poland.
Gross-Alksne - Alksnis.
The both old names has nothing common in linguistic sense. Gross is coined
from a German word gross - large, great,
but Alksne is a Germanized form of the name Alksnis that in Latvian means
alder-tree and is a popular name. I think that somewhere existed
a farm named Alkšņi, and the farmland was once split in two parts, and
a new farm was built. Now two farms with the same name existed, and to
distinguish them, the bigger one arose in the bureaucratic world under
the name Gross-Alkšņi. Later, when the people of the farm were named,
one family obtained the name Gross-Alksnis.
Holšteins also Bolšteins - Bolšteins.
The both names could be easy found in Germany (and in Latvia).
Zaicevs, Zaicis also Zaķis - Zaķis.
Zaķis means hare in Latvian. Other
two forms were coined of the Russian word zajec with the same
meaning.
Pūga also Poga - Poga.
Evidently the variant Pūga arose in Daugavpils, where the holder lived.
The word poga means in Latvian button
and the word is spelled and pronounced pūga in a Latgale dialect
spoken around Daugavpils.
3. In some cases not an existing variant of the name was chosen, but
quite a new name was invented:
Krampis also Krampe - Puķīte.
The grammatically correct form of the old name is Krampis, the form Krampe
could arise as a Germanized variant.
Cukurs also Cukers - Cers.
Cukurs means sugar in Latvian, but Cukers is a German form of the
word.
Čigans also Čeggans - Lejnieks.
Čigans means Gypsy in Latvian and Čeggans was a form made by a German
scribe, which I judge from the doubled "gg" in the name.
Gaaks also Haaks - Āķis.
The initial name was Haaks that was coined from the German word haack
meaning hook. In the Russian language documents the name was
spelled as Gaak and in this way another form arose. The meaning of the
Latvian name Āķis is also hook
Upiniks also Upiņš - Upīte.
May be the first variant of the name was a spoiled form of the name Upenieks,
but I am not sure. In any case, the both initial names sound as coined
from the Latvian word upe - river.
Upīte is the diminutive form of upe.
I think, however, that later his name was changed further and became Upītis,
which is a more common male form of the name.
Kunkulbergs also Kunkelbergs - Klints. The form Kunkelbergs
of the name seems to be more correct from the point of view of the German
language.
Lāce-Miška - Klints. His initial names means bear
in Latvian and Russian language respectively.
4. It could also happen that a person had quite different names and
chose one of them as the final form.
Čope called Ūdris - Ūdris.
I do not know who called him Ūdris, and how they knew that he should be
called by this name, quite possibly a person named Čope lived in the farm
Ūdri. I do not know what the name Čope was coined from, but the name Ūdris
means otter and is a common name for Latvians.
Nabagkupše also Ešentals - Ešentals. I think that
the word kupše in the first variant of the name stems from the
word kupcis - a merchant, but the first part
of the name was coined from the word nabags
(a poor man) that made the name offensive.
Vāvermuiža also Ješinskis - Ješinskis.
Vāvermuiža sounds as a place name and is coined from vāvere
- squirrel and muiža - manor.
Ješinskis is a different name of Polish origin.
Ābele also Bergmanis - Ābele.
The both names have nothing in common. Ābele means apple-tree
in Latvian, Bergmanis is a common German name coined from the words Berg
- a hill and Mann - a man.
Kiruška also Osis - Osis.
Mačuļevičs also Dubrovičs - Dubrovičs.
Mauriņš also Sniegs - Mauriņš
Tože also Briedis - Briedis
5. In some cases the variants of the names seem to have appeared some
time ago to avoid the offensive meaning of the initial name.
Pūslis also Pūslēns - Lejiņš. May be the holder tried
to make the initial form of the name Pūslis (it means bladder)
sounding better by changing it to Pūslēns.
Vilhelms Bullis-Bullītis changed his name to Birznieks,
and Jānis Bullis also Bullītis became Baltiņš.
Bullis means bull and does not sound very nice in Latvian. The
diminutive form of the word bullītis sounds
a bit better.
Dziesma (Cūkasdziesma) - Dziesma.
Evidently the holder of this name initially was called Cūkasdziesma.
This is a compound word and consists of cūka
- a pig and dziesma - a song,
so the name means - the song of pig. It is really difficult to
guess who could invent such a surprisingly original name, but, of course,
it sounds offensive. For this reason the holder could try to omit the
first part of the name and to call himself simply Dziesma, which was now
officially recognized.
Vectārps-Liepa - Liepa.
Vectārps consists of two parts: vecs - old
and tārps - a worm. Evidently the
offensive part is tārps. Though the meaning
of the name - an old worm seems to be rather strange, it is possible
to understand its origin. I think that somewhere existed a farm named
Tārpi, and the farmland was once split in two parts and a new farm was
built. Now two farms with the same name existed, and to distinguish them,
the initial farm was called Vectārpi - the old farm Tārpi, but for the
new farm a different name was found. Later, when the people of the farm
were named, a family received the name Vectārps. A good time ago the word
tārps in some regions was used not only for
worms, but also for snakes, so I think that the farm Tārpi was built in
a place characteristic of a lot of snakes.
6. One of the reasons for the name change was the offensive meaning of
the name. It was important that the name holder felt this meaning, the
real origin of the name was not important, of course.
Pautiņš - Pumpurs
Zilpautis also Pauts - Ziediņš
Pauts-Sproģis - Sproģis
These three cases of the name change have the same reason - the offensive
meaning of the word pauts (diminutive pautiņš).
Some time ago in the Latvian language two words were used for egg
- ola and pauts,
the second word not in all regions, however. These words were also used
to coin the farm names and later the person names from these farm names.
So far nothing offensive, but the both words were used also for testicles
like in English the word balls is. In the course of the language
development the word pauts lost its meaning
as an egg, now it is used in the language only as the word for testicles,
and a courteous person could not use it. This was the reason the names
coined from this word were changed. The name Zilpautis now meant - a person
with blue balls and sounded even worse than simply Pauts. The original
meaning of the name - blue egg was quite normal, because it was
not very difficult to find birds that laid blue eggs near a farm. A farm
Zilpauti was situated in Ipiķi pagasts and was renamed Vītiņi in 1928,
but may be there were also other farms with this name. By the way, from
other sources I know that the name Zilpauts sometimes was modified to
Zilpaušs in order to hide its meaning. There were several farms
Pautiņi, and one of them was situated in
Plāņu pagasts.
Bikse - Kļaviņš
Melnbiksis - Beverīns
Šekums - Kārkliņš
Some names were not very offensive but sounded not lovely. The three names
above were coined from the words that mean some parts of clothing. Bikse
sounds similar to bikses - trousers,
melnbiksis - a person wearing black trousers,
šekums - a fork that is created by two branches
of a tree, or by legs of a human (perineum) or of trousers. Really, it
is possible to find offensive sense in this word.
Kruķis - Rudzītis
Pīpe - Vēsmiņš
These two names coined from the words for home inventory also seemed
not fine for their holders. The oldest meaning of the word kruķis
is a poker, then it was also used for a crutch and later
for a policeman, a cop. Pīpe
is a pipe (for tobacco smoking).
Zvērs - Gulbis
Avens - Strautmalis
Vērsis - Vārpiņš
Sisenis - Laus
Klepperis - Alēns
Kuilis-Kuilas-Ķuiles - Krūmiņš
Borgs-Vepris - Aivars
The names of animals were used to coin these names. The feelings of an
ethnicity to various animals may have come from prehistoric times, when
totems were used, and are covered by various folklore items; and are also
reflected in the names of humans. Some animals seem to be good and some
bad. In the above list zvērs means - a beast,
avens is a regional word for a ram,
vērsis is an ox, sisenis
- a locust, though I think that the word was once used for a
cricket. Kleperis is a word now
used for an old worn out horse but initially was a name of a
breed of horses. Kuilis is a boar,
but other variants of the name of this particular family for me sound
as of Estonian origin, though I could not find a good guess in my Estonian
dictionary. The family Kuilis lived in Bormaņi manor of Trapenes
pagasts about 8 km from the Estonian border, by the way. The offensive
part of the name Borgs-Vepris was vepris
- a hog.
Putra - Silnieks
Siļķe - Zeltiņš
Dessa - Upmalis
Desa - Straume
Kartupelis - Dzintars
I do not know what it should mean, but the words for foodstuffs is rarely
used as human names in Latvian language, and if it happened, they were
readily changed as the above cases demonstrate. Putra
is porridge, siļķe - a herring,
desa (or the old spelling dessa)
- a sausage, kartupelis - a
potato.
Muļķis - Apinis
Duraks - Dravnieks
Gribulis - Veldre
Tupētājs - Upmalis
Skuķis - Skujiņš
Leitis - Lejiņš
The names of this group describes some qualities of a human. Muļķis
- a fool, duraks - also a fool,
but the word sounds similar to the appropriate word of the Russian language.
Gribulis is he-who-wants, it could
be realized from this name that the holder is sexually anxious. The word
tupētājs is difficult to explain. It is coined
from the verb tupēt that my dictionary translates
as to squat. The suffix -ājs is
used to derive the words for doers, so tupētājs
should be a squatter, but, of course, the word has nothing to
do with squatters in the West of America or with the cybersquatters. If
the offensive meaning of the word is needed, for me the name could be
associated with a person who has squatted to defecate, but I do not know
if a human should squat to defecate on open air or another verb is used
in this case by English speakers. The word skuķis
means a girl, but it is used only in informal speech, and, of
course, not every man would be happy to have the name with this meaning.
The meaning of the word leitis, and how it became offensive,
I have described in another Page.
7. Some names were changed without evident reasons.
Zaķis - Strautiņš
Silamednis - Mednis
Mumme - Mammis
The first two old names are plain Latvian names not worse than the new
ones. By the way, there were several families who changed the name Silamednis
to Mednis. The name Mumme really does not sound nice phonetically, but
the new variant Mammis is not better by my opinion.
8.
Piščans - Strautiņš
Pšigoda - Dimants
Pisarevs - Zeltiņš
Miklavics - Pūpols
Pocjuss - Pūce
Izaks (Isaks) - Dzintars
Volfsons - Vilciņš
Sačkevičs - Āre
Makars - Mednis
Šmoge - Ziemelis
Bikovskis - Ūsītis
Zeltišķis - Zeltiņš
Makaričevs - Grundulis
Hmeļņickis - Avotiņš
Roskalevitcs - Kļaviņš
Kirilka - Avotiņš
Rozenvalds - Rožmežs
Portnajs also Portnejs - Kalve
Kozlovskis - Liepiņš
Kaļinins - Kalniņš
Michelsons - Mierleja
Andreļuns - Kļaviņš
Berkevics - Ērglis
Juzups - Vilnis
The holders of these names evidently wished to acquire Latvian names
instead of their Russian, German, Lithuanian or Polish names. As a rule,
the new names have nothing common with the old ones in the linguistic
sense. A few exceptions are the name Volfsons that was coined from the
German word Wolf that means a wolf,
and the name Rozenvalds that were translated from German to Latvian obtaining
Rožmežs with the same meaning - rose + forest. I think that the
decision of Kaļinins was quite witty when the holder of this Russian name
found a phonetically close popular Latvian name Kalniņš, though the both
names have nothing common in their meanings.
9. It seems that Latvians were the most active in the name changing.
Not so many people of another ethnicity were found on the lists.
Čerepuks - Cvetkovs
Kotovs - Pavlovs
These two Russian names were changed to another Russian names without
visible reasons.
Leibesons - Leibsons
Aršs - Arss
The Jewish name Leibsons has more correct, or, in any case, more common
spelling than Leibesons. The name Aršs is also used by Jews, though in
German Arsch means ass. It happened
in some regions of Germany that Jews were supplied with offensive German
family names. Arss, of course, sounds better and means nothing,
I guess.
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