Where did i get my last name?? who started it??

Question:

Where did i get my last name?? who started it??

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: You didn't give your last name, but here are some ideas depending on where your ancestors came from.

According to Wikipedia, the inventor of surnames is unknown, and most people in Europe did not have surnames until the 12th century. Furthermore, "one of the most accepted theories for the origin of surname use attributes their introduction to the Normans and the Domesday Book of 1086. The use of surnames gradually became an accepted practice throughout Western Europe in the Middle Ages. In parts of the world, family names did not appear in common use until the 17th to 19th centuries, and they are unused in some cultures even today."

Surnames were adopted at different times in different places. For example, "in England hereditary surnames were adopted in the 13th and 14th centuries, initially by the aristocracy but, eventually, by everyone. By 1400, most English people and lowland Scots had acquired surnames, but many Irish, highland Scots and Welsh people did not adopt English-style surnames until the 17th century, or later."

As for which surnames are oldest, here are common types of surnames in Europe among which are probably the oldest European surnames:

* Occupations (e.g., Smith, Archer, Baker, Fisher)
* Personal characteristics (e.g., Short, Brown, Whitehead)
* Geographical features (e.g., Hill, Wood, Fields)
* Place names (e.g., London, Hamilton', Sutton, Flint)
* For those descended from land-owners, the name of their holdings, manor or estate
* Patronymics and Ancestry, often from a male's given name (e.g., Richardson, Williams, Johnson) or from a clan name (for those of Scottish origin, e.g., MacDonald, Forbes)

In Eastern Europe, many (or most) common folks did not adopt surnames until the late 18th or early 19th centuries, when forced to by their governments, who needed to be able to accurately identify people for taxation, conscription, and other useful things.

In China, by contrast, surnames were used by royalty prior to the 5th century BC and gradually became used by lower classes after 221 BC. Surnames like "Yao" and "Jiang" may be the oldest surnames in the world that are still in use.

In India, surnames and their origins vary fairly widely depending on the ethnic group, language, religion, and so forth, but "for Hindus belonging to the upper castes, the lineage of a person is known through his or her gothram, which is usually the name of the first traceable paternal ancestor in their lineage." (wikipedia)

So, if you are from Europe, China, or are a Hindu from India, these are some ideas about how your last name began.