Vivodina Surnames

by EMIL PESCHKE

C Copyright 1998, text by Emil Peschke

History and Origin

The use of a second name as a surname in the Vivodina area, in Croatia and in the whole of Europe, began in the early Middle Ages. Many surnames evolved from four main sources: patronymic or from the father's name; from locations where the family were living; from the occupation of the family; and from a characteristic of the family. Other surnames sources derived from: nicknames, animals, plants, food, tools, weapons, relations, noble titles, officer ranks, ethnic origin, days of the week, seasons, religion, something that happened to the family, or a big event in the family.

Vivodina is situated in the Croatian Region of Žumberak (Žuženberg, Sichelburg, Syhemberg) on the border with Slovenia. Croatia was for centuries part of the Hungarian Empire and later an integral part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Those two facts, along with the closeness of the Ottoman Empire and Italy, were very significant for the surnames that can be found today in this area. Turks were attacking Žumberak constantly, which was driving people away to safer areas. Big attacks were in 1431, 1469 and 1491, when the Turks enslaved many thousands of people. The rest of the population fled out of Žumberak. In the beginning of the 16th century Žumberak was almost without a population, but at the same time, larger groups of people started arriving in this area. People who were running away from the Ottomans settled in Žumberak and the Habsburgs encouraged this. In the year 1541, King Ferdinad moved 3000 Uskoks from Senj to the Region of Žumberak. The Uskoks brought with them the Čakavski dialect, which was spoken in Žumberak as a main dialect but slowly disappeared. In the first half of the 17th century the Kajkavski dialect was predominant in this region. Napoleon's army passed through the Žumberak Region and in nearby Metlika was stationed a French company. Some of the soldiers married and settled there.

Spelling and Changes

Croatian spelling is for the most part phonetic and the names or surnames were written as they are pronounced. However, Church Records were in Latin, but because Croatia was under Hungarian and Austro-Hungarian jurisdiction, names and surnames, as well as the names of the villages and towns were often spelled in Hungarian and German. Sometimes it was a combination of both languages, depending on how literate the priest was or which language he preferred. This practice was common until 1918 when Croatia was pushed into a new union which was called Kraljevina Srba Hrvata i Slovenaca (Kingdom of Serbs Croats and Slovenians), which was later named Jugoslavia. From this time records were in Latin and Croatian.

Spelling of the surnames was changed, sometimes by mistake of the person who was recording it, and sometimes, after the family moved to a place with different dialect or language, to blend in easier with new surroundings. Some people changed the spelling to advance at work or after they did so. In my own experience, while researching the Kljućec family from the Karlovac area, I found that every time the family moved the surname was changed. Initially the family was called Ključić, meaning "small key". When they moved to Srijem the last name was changed to Ključiš. The next generation moved to a different town in the Srijem Region and changed their last name to Ključec. When one member of the family moved to the USA he changed the surname to Keyes. Many Croatians had their surnames changed by the immigration officials when they were entering the USA. Croatian surnames were too hard to pronounce, or the immigration officers didn't know how to spell them correctly. Some of the Croatians, who arrived in North America in the last 50 years, chose to change the spelling of their family name to preserve the same sound of the surname. Some stuck to the original spelling, but in many instances the spelling was changed anyway because the English alphabet lacked characters like Ć, Č, Đ, Dž, Lj, Nj, Š and Ž. Blažević became Blazevic; Grubišić became Grubisic and Lukačić became Lukacic.

In early 19th century there was a movement of national awakening in Croatia called Ilirski pokret. Croatians were fighting for civil rights and for the Croatian language to be spoken in the government, offices, schools and universities. During the Ilirski movement many Croatian Patriots changed their German, Hungarian or Italian surnames to the Croatian equivalent. Ferdinand Wiesener was one of the leaders; he changed his name to Ferdo Livadić. The "Ilirski" movement also triggered many changes in the Croatian language. In 1830, Ljudevit Gaj published 'Croatian Grammar' which was the base of the modern Croatian language. Changes in the language were reflected in the surnames too. The most common change was the dropping of the letter 'e' as a second letter in the word, before the letter 'r': Berdar became Brdar, Ferlan became Frlan, Verbanek became Vrbanek. Verbot became Vrbot. The letters 'vu' or 'v' was changed into 'u' and Kavčić became Kaučić, Vugrinec became Ugrinec, and Vurušić became Urušić. Most of these changes were made in late 19th century, but today old and new versions of family names can be found in Croatia.

Some men had their surnames changed when they entered into the Matrilineal marriage. Sometimes the husband didn't have to accept his wife's last name but their children were registered in the Church books with their mother's surname. For example, on 11 February 1857, Blaž Lamot married Marija Suk. They had 10 children and all of them bear last name Suk. On the 16 March 1870, Blaž Lamot and Marija Suk buried their twins. In the Church death records they were entered as Barbara and Jakob Suk, the parents, Blaž Lamot and Marija Suk. Other Church records refer to Blaž as Lamot - Suk or Suk alias Lamot, sometimes as Blaž and Marija Suk. My maternal great grandfather was Juraj Martinčević; his parents were Jakob Marinčević and Terezija Martinčević. There's nothing wrong with this, only that in the Marriage records, Terezija Martinčević was married to Jakob Puncsecz (Punčec) who entered in to Matrilineal marriage and from this time was known as Martinčević.

Disintegration of the Bratstava or Porodičnih Zadruga (Clans) was another cause for changes of the surnames. All the members of the Clan had the same last name because everybody was descendent from the oldest member who was also Starješina (Chief or Alderman) of the Clan. His oldest son filled his position when "Starješina" died. Some of the large Clans had 4 or 5 married men and more then 30 members often living in one big house. Disintegration of the Clans in Croatia began in the 15th and 16th century but was stopped by the government. This didn't stop the people's desire to be on their own and many of the Clans disintegrated illegally. Members who separated from the Clan changed their surname or added a new name to the name of the Clan. Even today, some people will introduce themselves as "My name is Miheli, but we are also known as Klobučar".

In the 1870's, the Croatian government legalized disintegration of the Clans to speed up this process. In 1910, the last Clan was disintegrated and their land was divided between the members. However, in spite of this, some of the Clans were still around between two World Wars. The last Clans in Croatia were in the region of Žumberak.

Croatian Alphabet

For many researchers who do not speak Croatian, misspelled or mispronounced names are a big problem because they are simply looking for something which does not exist, or is there in another form which they don't recognize. To help with this problem here is the Croatian alphabet with pronunciations and equivalents in Hungarian, German and English for some Croatian letters.

A, a = Account

B, b = Bob

C, c = sound "C" doesn't occur in standard english, but it is similar to sound ts in cats or mitts.

Č, č = Chick

Ć, ć = no english equivalent, sound as Ch only softer.

D, d = Day

Dž,dž = Joy

Đ, đ = George

E, e = Egg

F, f = Farm

G, g = Girl

H, h = House

I, i = Index

J, j = York

K, k = Kettle

L, l = Last

Lj, lj = Million, Billion

M, m = Milk

N, n = Neck

Nj, nj = Newly, News

O, o = Old

P, p = Park

R, r = Rag

S, s = Salt

Š, š = Sharp

T, t = Tea

U, u = Good, Proof

V, v = Victoria

Z, z = Zoo, Zest

Ž, ž = Measure, Pleasure or Zsa Zsa Gabor

Croatian letter equivalents in Hungarian, German and English

The Meaning Of Some Vivodina Surnames

References:

-Encikolopedija hrvatske povijesti i kulture

-Veliki rijčnik stranih riječi; by Bratoljub Klaić

-Rije nik stranih riječi; by Marijan Filipović

-Deutsche-Kroatische Wörterbuch; by M.Uroić & A. Hurm

-Latinsko - Hrvatski riječnik; by Bekavac, Marević & Međeral

-Deutsche Namenlexikon; by Hans Bahlow

-Encikolopedija Jugoslavanskog Lekikografskog Zavoda