Research into the history of family names. The components, types and system of the Hungarian family-name stock

Summary of a habilitation dissertation

Abstract

Research into the history of family names. The components, types and system of the Hungarian family-name stock. Summary of a habilitation dissertation  

The author’s habilitation dissertation focuses on the concept system and the main types of the Hungarian family name stock. Apart from the old Hungarian family name stock developed in the natural process of giving names, special attention is given to the pool of artificial family names which evolved in the process of modern name changes and to family names of foreign origin. The paper discusses the theoretical and practical approaches to joint and distinct analysis of the characteristic features and their relations involving all three categories. Case studies concerning the history of writing, morphology, lexis and semantics are used to exemplify the different types or levels of research adopting the above principles. These case studies examine the name stocks both in their diachrony and synchrony, exploring intra- and extra-linguistic factors in the background.