My last name is Elisalde.I know that it's related to the basque name Elizald

Question:I've never met my grandfather and he was never a big enough part of my own father's life for him to ever find out the reasoning of this from family. It was an old basque couple who lived down the street from him growing up for him to learn what his last name was. I'm a spitting image of my grandfather and I have all the features seen in the average basque so I can only assume that it's not too far down the lineage. Do any of you have any information?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: I've never met my grandfather and he was never a big enough part of my own father's life for him to ever find out the reasoning of this from family. It was an old basque couple who lived down the street from him growing up for him to learn what his last name was. I'm a spitting image of my grandfather and I have all the features seen in the average basque so I can only assume that it's not too far down the lineage. Do any of you have any information?

Well, Elisalde (to use that spelling first) is also commonly found as Elizalde, De Elizalde, De Elisalde, Elizaldi, Elisaldi De Elizaldi and De Elisaldi.

This is just oh so common surname mangling. Remember, it wasn't that long ago that being able to read and write was not common. So whenever surnames were recorded, it was often done by someone other than the person themself. An illiterate person would state their surname to a semi-illiterate clerk who would make their best guess at the spelling. Two clerks sitting right next to each other could come up with two different spellings.

Add to that problems with immigrant accents, and mangling compounds. When did each form happen? Well, probably many, many times. Ellis island, ship manifest, a person themself using one version at one point in their life and another version at another time. Especially in immigration, a family member would spell their surname the same as their "sponsor" in the new country even if not how they spelled it themselves to eliminate potential questions about whether they were truly related.

This is really just surname mangling that is incredibly common in genealogy. In fact, I would doubt there is anyone here who has lines back even 3 or 4 generations that hasn't faced this. It is truly that common.