THE MEANING AND RESEARCH OF MY POLISH LAST NAME, SURNAME?

Poland was once known for its horse-hair sieves which had a myriadf of uses -- in the kitchen, in the mill, for bolting flour, in the building sector for sieving gravel or various size as well as fine sand. Since that was a highly specialist occupation it would all the more so becoeme an ocaupational nicknamne,

I work with a 25 year old polish girl who calls herself Pauline (Paulina) Carson, What would be the polish version of this name?

Hello,

I have lots of questions regarding some of the history of my family coming to the US in 1901-1902 from Poland with regard to politics, name changes and ethnicity. I will have to address those in the correct forums, though. However, with regard to the meaning of my last name....it appears the true spelling is Oczkowicz. Any thoughts on what that means? A polish doctor I work with told me it had something to do with eyes. Thanks very much.

OCZKOWICZ: root-word: oko (eye), specifically its diminutive form oczko (lttile eye). Someone may have been nicknamed Oczko becuase of something about his eyes -- maybe they were small and beady or maybe he only had one. But it could have also origianted as a toponymic tag for an inhabitant of Oczków (Eyeville) or Oczkowice (Eyesonville). Whichever the case, when Oczko sired a son, fellow-villagers gave the offspring a patronymic nick and Oczkowicz was born!

Grudzien...yes it means December..the root words for it are derived from Grud, a Russian word meaning earth or breast and dzien, the Polish of course for day..so our name Grudzien means Earth Day or earth morning...I find it interesting that one of the coldest months and last month of the year would be given the non-Gregorian calendar name of Grudzien.

It could have indicated the month in which someone was born or converted from Judaism to Catholicism.

Sorry for being such a nit picker but you have made few mistakes in your post.


Why would we have to borrow this name from Russian, if the Rusians themselves use the word "декабрь" for December, transliterated dekábr', derived from number 10? There is a word "gruda" in Polish, which means a frozen ground, or a clod (clod translates back to "gruda", "grudka", "gruda ziemi").

Etymology: "grudzień" or "grudnia" - used as a name for the 12th month since 15th c. in Poland. It comes from the Old Slavonic "grudьńь" - meaning a period when the ground is frozen, covered with clods. Other old Polish names of the 12th month of the year are:

+ prosień - from an old Slavic god of millet (proso in Polish), a protector of livestock
+ prosieniec - from the verb "sijać" (to shine, to radiate). The sun rays reflect from the snow covered ground. All appears lighter, brighter.

+ listopad - now November, a period when leaves fall
+ gódnik - used also in modern Kashubian, from the word Gody - old name for Christmas
+ jadwent and jadwient - folk version of the word adwent, advent in English


Non-Gregorian? It is actually the last, 12th month the year, according to Gregorian calendar. You must have had in mind the Old Roman calendar (or calendar of Romulus). It had only 10 months, with the last month December (from dece, ten), and 304 days. The missing days between December and Martius (the first month) were unassigned.

Most European languages 'incorrectly' borrowed the December name from Roman calendar to Julian and then to Gregorian calendars.

Only few European languages keep their own name of this month, having nothing to do with number 10:
Belarusian: сне́жань, transliterated as snežanʹ (a month of snowing)
Ukrainian: грудень, transliterated as gruden' (same as Polish grudzień)
Polish: grudzień
Lithuanian: gruodis
Croatian: prosinac
Czech: prosinec - meanings:
1. of old Czech prosiněti - flashes of sun between clouds;
2. of old Czech siný - livid (ie blue-gray);
3. from the word pig (Polish prosię) (slaughter time of pigs)
Finnish: joulukuu

What is the meaning of Pluskota?

Splasher ?

My family last names are Szulc and Olearczyk my family was from Sulejow which is from Lodz?

pawian
Splasher?

How did you get that? :)

Ahhh I see... pluskać I was thinking more along the lines of: Plus-kot(a)

Can anyone tell me the meaning of Niderla? it is not a typical Polish last name but there are many of us in Poland, my grandparents and their grandparents were Polish but I can't work out its origin.

Niderla - from a German personal name "Niederle", this in turn from High German "Ni(e)derlein", and this from the compound name " Nitheri". stankiewicze.com/index.php?kat=44&sub=546

The fact that the word "Netherlands", "Nederland" in Dutch, is spelled "Niderlandy" in Polish may be or may be not a pure coincidence.

Either way: German and Dutch settlers had been coming to Poland for centuries.

Hi,

Just wondering if you can help, my grandfathers surname was Czornanycz, are you able to tell me a bit more about this name?

I understand the ycz is the part added on as 'son of' but how far back would this practice have taken place?

I'm struggling to find any other czornanycz families other than my own and wondered if czorna, czorn, czorney or czorny could be 'americanised' version of the same surname?

Thanks.

CZORNANYCZ: This surname appears to be of Ukrainian origin, although the spelling is Polish. In Ukrainian it would have been written be Чорнанич, but all Cyrillic names get transliterated into languages using the Latin alphabet. My guess is that this name could have originated as a topo-patronymic nickname. Someone from one of several localities called Чорнa (Czorna) could have been dubbed Чорный, and the son he fathered might have been called Чорнанич. Anotehr option is that the father was called Чорный (Blackie), because of his dark complexion and raven hair, but his offspring could have been called Чорнанич all the same.

The fact that the name got transliterated into Czronanycz rather than Czornanicz (the Russian version) points to its Ukrainian origin.
Chorny and Chorney are quite likely English adaptations of the Russian/Ruthenian root “chorn-” indicating blackness.

I was wondering if you had anything for Pluskota?

Fantastic, thank you so much. You are so knowledgable!

PLUSKOTA: pluskota is a synonym of słota - foul, wretched, rainy weather. The verb pluskotać means to splash as when stomping through puddles. Someone who had that habit or (toponymically) an inhabitant of such places as Pluksi or Plukocin migth have acquried the Pluskota nickname-turned.-surname.

That's fascinating! thank you!

I would be interested in meaning of surname Kierna.Thanks!

KIERNA: possibly derived from the Old Polish word kiernia (butter-churn). It migth have been the nickname given to a butter-churner or butter-churn maker. Or perhaps a topo tag for someone from Kierzno (Churnville).

RATAJCZYK: root-word rataj (peasant farmer); -czyk is a patronymic ending indicating an offspring, in this case the farmer's..

BEDNARKOW: root-word bednarz (cooper); also possibly a patronymic

GU-NICZAK: root-word guz (lump, tumor); guźny could have been the nick for someone with lots of lumps on his body and Guźniczak would have been his son.

NOTE: All three above surnames could have laso been of toponymic (place-name) origin.

For more information please contact me.

Family name is CICH and I've traced it back to the early 1500's in south central Poland ( 20 k from Tarnow) and has not been changed or altered in church and cemetery records.

Hello,

I wonder what is the background on these names:

Kuczyński
Maley
Bekier
Pindel

Also if you provide any genealogy service and more name information I will glady get in touch, thank you.

KUCZYŃSKI: topo tag from Kuczyn or Kuczyna

MALEY(?): possibly Anglicized version of Mały (little guy, shrimp, pint size)

BEKIER: Polish phonetic respelling of German Bäcker (baker)

PINDEL: from verb pindzryć się (to primp) -- a fop, someone who fusses over his appearance in front of a mirror.

For more information, heraldic links, etc. concerning the above surnames please contact me.

Anyone know the meaning of the surname that sounds like Cherwanik?

My guess is Czerwonik, Czerwoniuk or Czerwoniak from the adjective "czerwony" (red). The resulting surname refers to a red object of some sort. Here is one example: "Czarujący 'czerwoniak' na ulicach Poznania" - "The charming 'czerwoniak' on the streets of Poznan" - referring to a photo of an old fashioned red bus, mapofpoland.net/Poznan,photo,2,42451,Czarujacy---czerwoniak---na-ulicach-Poznania.html.

Very rare surname in Poland (16, 17, 54 names in Poland, correspondingly), according to (incomplete) database "Moi Krewni" (my family) moikrewni.pl/mapa/kompletny/czerwoniak.html. Google shows (14,000 11,000 88,000) references to these words.

Thank you for your reply, I found a village in East Prussia, which is also called Czerwanken
progenealogists.com/germany/prussia/pru-c.htm
in the Ukraine is a village named Cherwanyi granit. In the old books I have met the last names with a root Cherwan.
could it be that all these names came from the word Cherwan-cervan something?

my name is Woronowicz. it originate from ancient east of Poland. today's associations of this name are wrona what means crow, wrony black horse, or Russian voron raven. what else can it mean? what can by real origin of this name?

The Ukrainian words for Polish "czerwony" is "червоний" (red) and "granit" is "граніт" (granite). There is a mineral of that name called "czerwony granit", as shown for example here:

r-granit.ub.ua/goods/view/22816


There are Ukrainian companies of this name and I would not be surprised if there were also villages named after this mineral too. But what is so special about the noun "granite" in the context of your name search? Ukrainian culture likes the red color, and there are thousands of "red-noun" combinations over there.

Russians also like this colour so much that their word for "red" is close to the word for "beautiful" - красный (krasnyj, krasnyĭ) vs. красивый (krasivyj, krasivyĭ). Ukrainians use the words "червоний" (czerwonyj, chervonyy̆) and "красивий" (krasiwyj, krasyvyy̆), correspondingly. [The first transliteration is Polish, the second is according to uncle Google].


Use whatever transliteration suits you: Polish czerwan or English cherwan, but they are the roots of the word "redness". The corresponding Polish word is "czerwień". Apparently the pre-root comes from the word "czerwiec", as in "czerwiec polski", Polish cochineal, a scale insect formerly used to produce a (very expensive) crimson dye of the same name, colloquially known as "Saint John's blood", en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_cochineal.

Czerwiec in Polish is also a name of the sixth month of the year, June in English. In Ukrainian it is called "Червень" (Czerweń, Chervenʹ). The meaning of this word comes either from fore mentioned insect, or from a "czerw", a bee larva.


I forgot to answer this. Yes, there is a village Czerwonki - gmina (municipality) Mrągowo, powiat (district, county) Mrągowo, Warmian-Masurian Voivodship (Province). It has been also known under the names Czerwanken, Czerwonken, Czerwonki, Rotenfelde.

And there is another village Czerwonki in the administrative district of Gmina Radziłów, within Grajewo County, Podlaskie Voivodeship, in north-eastern Poland.

There is also a big village Czerwonak (Old name: Czerwony Młyn, Red Mill) just north-east of Poznań. Renamed Rotental by Germans in 1941.

Hi I'm trying to figure out the origins of this Polish last name but so far I cannot come up with anything.
"Bezrudczyk"

Now I am aware that "Czyk" is associated with Polish royality back in the 15th century, under the reign of Kazimierz IV, but I cannot decipher the rest of the last name.