Most famous, respected Polish last names?

Arg it sucks, then on top of all the Nowaks, theres Nowakowski!
I wonder why there are so many similar surnames, are we like, all, related in some way or something?

Nowak comes from nowy = new.

So does that mean that all new people to poland were called "Nowak"? (back in the day)

new arrival to a village was called Nowak

Witold is right.

I love one American of Polish-German descent going by a beautiful Polish name: Bukowski

didn't Bukowski write that book about polish ham on rye?

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  bukowski.jpg
  

LOl looks like it :)

How about last names ending with sky? I know ska is a womans' maiden name and ski would be the mans'. but would names with sky mean someone in the family tree was jewish? or does it depend on the area of poland?

top popular surnames in Poland: futrega.org/etc/nazwiska.html


nope. My family is Jewish and my last name doesn't end with -ski at all :)
I think that '-ski' is just a typical ending for polish adjectives, thats all.

from franciszek i have a cousin in warsaw whos surname is wisniewski mine is bryszkiewski

Names ending with -ski, -cki were reserved mostly mostly for nobles (these are Polish von or de) So Adam ze Zborowa (Adam from Zborów) in XVth or XVIth century become Adam Zborowski.

But then other people also wanted to have this ending so it is not 100% that only noble families have sch ending.
Names that are "strainght" as Nowak, Krzak etc mainly mean that they were farmers.

Jews didn't have surenames in Poland so in 1795 when Ist RP was divided between Prusia, Austra and Russia the Prusian adiministration had a problem with them and some oficialist had just given them names "from dictionary" and that is why they have often german names and the names are so similar.

In Polish towns and cities you can find also quite a lot of German names. Some written originally som changed. It is becouse in midle ages the inhabitants of Polish towns were mainly Germans. Most of them got "Polonised" during the ages but the names stayed. Also in XIX century a lot of german buinessman came to Poland (to the Rusiian side) to build factories. I had for example 2 friends - one is Fischer - his family came here about 100 years ago, and the second is Fiszer - so this family was here probably much longer. it is most probable that you will fing german names in proffesions an places that are occupied by "old town class" as teachers (I had Mr Braun, Ms Stec, Ms Wagner) doctors, lawyers etc..

Lukasz

yes I know most Jewish last names don't end with ski. I allways wondered the difference between names ending with ski and sky. Majority of ski are polish, but would sky be different? Russian? Lith.? Czeck? Jewish? Any Ideas?

i think, and maybe wrong, that the "sky" would be russian.

but what about the "wicz"? was this just tacked on?

see ive been told that throughout the centuries Pol-Jews changed their names from "ski" to "sky" for religious purposes, but Im not sure. Lots of Russians do have last name w/ sky

jew, catholic, protestant, if they are polish then they should be "ski".

however, if they were of russian origin then yes, there name may end with "sky"

that is my understanding.