SPANISH NAMES
In Spain people have one or two first names (nombres) and two surnames (apellidos). The concept of middle names does not exist in Spain, so they often get confused when we give them our name – e.g. John Gerald Smith – they then think that John is the first name, Gerald the first surname and Smith the second surname.
When I first came to Spain 17 years ago with my one first name and one surname, the computer at the bank insisted on calling me Nina Jensen Jensen, otherwise it could not register me.
First Name
Traditionally children were named after Catholic saints or some religious concept. Thus it is not unusally to meet an Inmaculada Concepción (inmaculate conception), a Dolores (pains) or indeed an Ángel (angel).
Every day of the year has a saint’s name, for example, 3rd June is Santa Clotilda, 23rd is San Juan, 30th December San Raúl etc.
People named after a saint have a ‘saint’s day’. I.e. if your name is Clotilda, your saint’s day is on 3rd June, if it’s Juan your saint’s day is on 23rd June. The saint’s day is celebrated more or less as a birthday – to some people it is in fact more important than a birthday.
The demand that people should have biblical names died with Franco. Now you may name your child what you want as long as the name can not cause the child to be ridiculed or be offensive to him/her or others.
Many names are commonly abbreviated just like our Richard/Dick, James/Jim etc.
The most common ones are:
José Pepe
Josefa Pepa
Francisco Paco
Francisca Paqui
Inmaculada Inma
Concepción Chon
Ignacio Nacho
Manuel Manolo
And when the second first name is Manuel this is often shortened to ‘ma’, so we’ve got JuanMa, JoseMa, FranMa (Francisco Manuel), etc.
Surnames
You will have noticed that whenever you apply for an official document or fill in forms you are asked for your father’s and mother’s first names. The reason is as follows:
As mentioned above, everybody has two surnames. One comes from the father, the other from the mother.
You use the parents’ first surnames to make up the child’s, the first surname being the paternal and thus the family name. So if Juan Pedrosa Jiménez and María López Rodríguez have a daughter and they christen her Genoveva, her full name will be Genoveva Pedrosa López.
So traditionally, by knowing your two surnames and the first names of your parents the authorities would know who you were.
In the name of equality, however, you are now allowed to put the mother’s first surname first, so Genoveva could be Genoveva López Pedrosa. But whichever way around the parents decide to put the surnames, this must be carried on in all the following siblings.
If the father of the child is unknown it will simply receive both the mother’s surnames.
Genoveva’s mum is señora López her dad is señor Pedros. As you can see, the second surname is often left out. Often, however, if a person has an unusual second surname, he will be identified by this, as in the instances of artist Pablo Ruiz Picasso, poet Federico García Lorca and prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, señor Picasso, señor Lorca and señor Zapatero respectively.
A woman does not change her surname when she is married, so the concept ‘maiden name’ is not applicable in Spain.
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