The influence of some feudal legal institutions on the surnames of the Hungarian nobility

  • Zoltán Megyeri-Pálffi Debreceni Egyetem
DOI: https://doi.org/10.29178/NevtErt.2011.3
Keywords: family names, names of nobility, legal questions of name bearing, inheritance of names, name change, history of law, feudal Hungary, historical anthroponomastics

Abstract

The influence of some feudal legal institutions on the surnames of the Hungarian nobility  

 

In Hungary, in the period of the stabilization of two-constituent names, the nobility, setting an example also in name bearing, accepted several regulations resulted in name changes, each of which was rooted in the legal system of the feudal Hungary. Marriage (as a result of its property right consequences), changes in estates, assignment in kind of the quarter inherited by a daughter, investment with the rights of a son, contemporary forms of adoption could all lead to (deliberate) changes in surnames, as these feudal legal institutions influenced financial conditions. This paper explains the so far neglected aspects of the relation between the history of law and name bearing, and describes the contemporary plasticity of name use as observed in the cases of some noble families.

Published
2011-12-30
Issue
Vol. 33 (2011)
Section
Articles