What´s in a name ? or the possible perils of tongue twisters

I have recently become very fascinated by names and it all started in an English class I rather innocently started by teaching the tongue twister about Peter Piper. To make it easier for the students to say it I started to explain the meaning of the words so it would make more sense. First I explained it was about a person whose first name was Peter and whose second name was Piper and that it is common for English last names to be associated with professions. Simple enough, but in Spain everyone has two last names, so which exactly is the second name? It´s a bit of a riddle to explain the Spanish name system because your first last name is your father´s first surname which in turn was his father´s first last name and then similarily the second last name is your mother´s surname which is her father´s first name and in short the paternal name is carried over to successive generations. These two last names never change which means you will not have the same surname as your entire family, nor your spouse. Explaining that in Canada people often change their last name and eve create new names makes me wondering which is more or less confusing. I was also told that is only recently that the laws in Spain have made it possible to change your first name. This has allowed a well-known man, now woman after a sex change operation to officially go by her new name Bibiana.

At this point I thought I would describe the meaning of my last name and I explained that ´McBride´ is an Irish name meaning ´Mc¨= son of and ´Bride´= follower of St. Brigid. In similar style I was told the ´ez´ suffix means ´son of´ for example Martinez means son of Martin.

The discussion on middle names didn´t last very long because they don´t exist in Spain, but I found learning about first names quite intriguing. For example when someone tells me their first name is Nacho I would not necessarily now that their real name is Ignacio because I more immediately think what a strange idea to name your son after Mexican corn chips. When I think about it everyone in my family goes by a diminutivee,so it really shouldn´t seem so strange in Spanish it´s just I never thought about it before. As it is common to be named after your parents, so is the usage of diminutives. Here is a short list I have collected: Manuel (Lolo), Francisco ( Paco, Quico), Fernando ( Nando), Jose ( Pepe, Che), Enrique (Quique), etc. Similarily longer names are abreviated: Maria del Carmen ( Mamen) or Jose Manuel (Chema). Really the stranger naming tradition now seems to be in Cuba where parents are creating names from a combination of the father and mother´s first name and sadly ´Usnavi´ (U.S. Navy) has also become popular from ships in the port.

To conclude on a slightly unrelated but just as curious note the name of Spain comes from the word Hispania which is believed to mean ´Land of Rabbits´ and stranger yet is that I have not seen any rabbits since I have arrived.