希望英语 take names
Did you know that western name has the meaning?
Western family names also have the meaning much like Chinese name.
The only difference is that many family names are very old.
Every name has its own beginning.
Maybe from other language, maybe from English or Middle English, German, Italian, French, Latin.
The names have changed over years.
But they are still meaningful.
For example: there are simple names like Johnson that means the son of John. They are lots of sons. Also you may have name like carpenter, do you know what carpenter is?
A baker makes bread. So your name might be Jane baker. And if your last name is baker and you know your ancestors used to do. They used to make bread.
So if you mean Jim baker today, she is probably not making bread today.
So now we know what name came from.
And also it can show your family history. For example you can have a name that is obvious a name from some country. Like a name of Garcia, if you hear a name Garcia. We would know it’s a Spanish name. It’s not really English.
And somewhere your family may have some Spanish heritage from Spanish speaking country, like Mexico or maybe like Spain. So in America people will celebrate all those different names. People try to know from your name what country are your ancestor’s.
O’Carroll is Irish or Bergerac is French.
But often Show your cultural heritage
I have a friend whose name is Jan Capelin. Jan Capalino is an Italian name. You may think he is an Italian people. Dark skin but he actually has white skin. Because all of his ancestors are English, except for one.
Maybe five generations ago, his great great great great father was Italian, so even his look is like English. His family name is Capalino.
The last is family name. Jim smith so we say it’s the one comes last in English.
So that’s the opposite from Chinese.
You know in west we often change name when we get married. It’s nice if you don’t like your family name and you can change your name to your husband’s name. It’s nice.
It’s only women who do this. The men never change their name. And sometimes women don’t change their name. It just depends.
They choose to or not to. It’s all ok.
That’s we have called maiden name. That means before you were married. My maiden name is Jin. After I got married, I took my husband’s name. Because we find it is easier to have one name is one family. And I become Mike Innice. Mike Innice is a name from Scotland. Mike like mc Donald. Mike means son of garlic. Innice is angers son of angers. So mc Donald might be son of Donald.
Very interesting. My maiden name is Tral which is English. My married name is Coogles which we also use in all my family. People are often asking me about my German heritage. But I don’t have German heritage. I told them it’s only my husband’s family name. So I just told them it’s my married name.
There is a famous maxim by William Shakespeare.
And he says “what’s in the name?
A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”
And it’s famous quotation about names.
What do you think about means? Can you guess?