Lithuanian name

A Lithuanian personal name, like in most an cultures, consists of two main elements: the (vardas) followed by  (pavardė). The usage of s in is generally governed (in addition to personal taste or family custom) by three major factors:, , and tradition. Lithuanian names always follow the rules of the. Lithuanian male names, as well as the rest of words, have preserved the masculine endings (-as; -is), that make the look similar to s.

Vardas (given name)
A child in Lithuania is usually given one or two given names. Nowadays the second given name is rarely used in everyday situations, the use of a being considered pretentious. In additions to modern names, parents normally choose a name or names for their child from a long list of traditional names which may be:


 * a name of pre-Christian origin.

A majority of them are double-stemmed personal names, of origin. These ancient Lithuanian names are constructed from two interconnected s, the combination of which has been used to denote certain beneficial personal qualities, for example Jo-gaila mean "a strong rider". Although virtually extinct following the, they continued to exist as , such as , , or in their Slavicised versions, as well as in s. The existing surnames and written sources have allowed the reconstruction of names by linguists, such as. During the these names returned to popular use after a long period of neglect. Children are often named in honor of most reverred historical Lithuanian rulers, making their names one of the most popular. They include, , ,. In line with the double-stemmed names, shorter variants containing only one stem were also used, such as and. Since there are few pre-Christian female names recorded in written sources, they are often reconstructed from male variants, in addition to the historical, , etc.


 * a, i.e., a or a.

The use of Christian names in the Lithuanian language long predates the adoption of Christianity by Lithuanians. The linguistic data attest that first Biblical names were started to be used in as early as in the. The earliest strata of such names originates from ; they were borrowed by in their  versions. The examples of such names are Antanas, Povilas , Andrius and Jurgis. The later influx of Christian names came after the adoption of Christianity in 1387. They are mostly borrowed in their versions: Jonas, Vladislovas/Vladas , Kazimieras/Kazys , etc.


 * a  or  used as a name.

There are popular names constructed from the words for celestial bodies (Saulė for, Aušrinė for ), events of nature (Audra for the storm, Aušra for the , Rasa for the , Vėjas for the wind, Aidas for the ), plants (Linas/Lina for , Eglė for ), river names (Ūla, Vilija for ).


 * an invented name from literature.

Some names were created by the authors of literal works and spread in public use through them. Such names were invented following the rules of the Lithuanian language, therefore it is sometimes difficult do tell, whether the name is fictitious and had never existed before. Notably, Gražina, Živilė by, Daiva by , Šarūnas by and others.


 * names of Lithuanian pagan deities and mythological figures.

There are some popular names of gods and godesses from that are used as personal names, such as ', godess of luck, ', godess of earth, ', godess of fire; Žilvinas, a serpent prince from the fairy tale ', Jūratė, goddess of the sea, and Kastytis, from the legend about .

A distinctive practice dominated in the of , then being a part of , where Lithuanized  were common, such as Ansas , Grėtė , Vilius  among.

The choice of a given name is largely influenced by fashion. Many parents may name their child after a or heroine, some otherwise famous person, or a character from a book, film, or. In spite of this, a great number of names used in today's Lithuania have been in use since the ancient times.

Sex differentiation
Lithuanian male and female names are different grammatically. Almost all Lithuanian female names end in the vowels -a or -, while male names always end in -s, and rarely in a vowel -a. When the male name ending in -a has its female counterpart, it ends in -ė, such as  and Jogailė. Female double-stemmed Lithuanian names always end in -ė.

Diminutives
s are very popular in everyday usage, and are by no means reserved for children. The allows for a great deal of creativity in this field. Most diminutives are formed by adding a. For female names it may be -elė, -utė, -ytė, -užė; certain suffixes are more common to specific names over the rest.

Also, as in many other cultures, a person may informally use a (pravardė) in addition to or instead of a given name.

Pavardė (surname)
Lithuanian surnames, like those in most of Europe, are hereditary and generally, i.e., passed from the father on to his children.

A married woman usually adopts her husband's name. However, other combinations are legally possible. The wife may keep her (mergautinė pavardė) or add her husband's surname to hers, thus creating a. It is also possible, though rare, for the husband to adopt his wife's surname or to add his wife's surname to his family name.

History
Family names first appeared in Lithuania ca. and were only reserved to the. They usually derived from s.

The most striking peculiarity of the historical Lithuanian heraldic system, which is adopted from the Polish one in the in, is that a coat of arms does not belong to a single family. A number of unrelated families (sometimes hundreds of them), usually with a number of different family names, may use a coat of arms, and each coat of arms has its own name.

The use of family names gradually spread to other social groups: the by the end of the, then the. The process finally ended only in the mid-, and due partial of society at the time many names were influenced by Polish form of the name.

Classification
Based on origin, Lithuanian family names may be generally divided into three groups: cognominal, toponymic and patronymic.

Cognominal
A cognominal surname derives from a person's nickname, usually based on his occupation, or a physical or character trait.

Examples:
 * Kalvis, Kalvelis, Kalvaitis — from kalvis ("blacksmith");
 * Naujokas, Naujokaitis — from naujas ("new one");
 * Kairys, Kairelis, — from kairė ("left side").

Toponymic
A toponymic surname usually derives from the name of a village or town,  or the name of a topographic feature.

Examples:
 * Užugiris — from across the forest (už girios);
 * Kalnietis — from the mountains (kalnai).

Patronymic
A surname derives from a given name of a person and usually ends in a suffix suggesting a family relation.

Examples:
 * Jonaitis, Janavičius, Jankauskas, Januitis — derived from Jonas ;
 * Adomaitis, Adamonis, Adamkevičius, Adamkus — derived from Adomas ;
 * , Lukša, Lukošius, Lukoševičius — derived from Lukas.

For this group of names the use of Slavic suffixes -avičius (from "-owicz"), -auskas (from "-owski") is very common.

Feminine forms
Lithuanian surnames, unlike in the most of Europe, have specific forms. While a masculine surname usually ends in -as, -ys or -is, its feminine equivalent ends in -ienė or rarely -uvienė for married women and -aitė, -utė, -iūtė or -ytė for unmarried ones. Examples:

Formal and informal use
Lithuanians pay great attention to the correct way of referring to or addressing other people depending on the level of social distance, familiarity and politeness. The differences between formal and informal language include:
 * using surnames vs. given names;
 * using vs. not using honorific titles such as Ponas / Ponia;
 * using the third person singular forms vs. second person singular.

Ponas / Ponia
Ponas and Ponia ( Pone, Ponia) are the basic honorific styles used in Lithuanian to refer to a man or woman, respectively. In the past, these styles were reserved to members of the  and played more or less the same roles as "Lord" or "Sir" and "Lady" or "Madame" in English. Since the 19th century, they have come to be used in all strata of society and may be considered equivalent to the English "Mr." and "Ms." There is a separate style, Panelė ("Miss"), applied to an unmarried woman.

Given name / surname order
The given name(s) normally comes before the surname. However, in a list of people sorted alphabetically by surname, the surname usually comes first. In many formal situations the given name is omitted altogether.

Informal language
Informal forms of address are normally used only by relatives, close friends and co-workers. In such situations diminutives are often preferred to the standard forms of given names.

Notes and references

 * In-line:


 * General:

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