Oh, damn, that is just like most other languages. (grin).
--
Boris Liberman wrote:
Hi!
ft> I guess many cultures used "son of" as a suffix, for a second name.
ft> I know that in French, a suffix like "ault" means son of (or something like
ft> that); so Renault is "son of Rene", Perrault is likely "son of Pierre" and
ft> Theriault is "son of Thierry". I don't know when these things ft> "crystallized", such that those surnames stuck, and one stopped being named
ft> after there fathers. As you said, I'm sure there were local variations, and
ft> in some areas the custom may have persisted longer than others; indeed, in
ft> some areas it may not have happened at all.
Frank, some years ago my wife and I went to Dijon for vacation. We were amazed about how many words in Russian are actually on loan from French.
In particular, "ov" suffix (just like "ault") means son of. So Ivanov (surname) means actually "son of Ivan". Which by the way sounds very much alike its French counter-part.
Boris
-- graywolf http://graywolfphoto.com
"You might as well accept people as they are, you are not going to be able to change them anyway."
