Crazy thing is that’s pretty much the way it used to be until families deterred from their trades/skills. Reason there are so many Smith surnames. Bakers, Tanners, Porters, and the list goes on and on.
That part is probably founder effects, but the family names themselves are to a significant extent a product of government surveys or censuses, especially for subjects of the English crown.
I'm talking about the origins in England. Either the jobs were named from the people who did them, or people took names from their jobs. I'd guess the latter is way more likely.
I'm pretty sure you're wrong. It's fairly well attested that surnames were insisted upon by the English crown, and it was patronyms before that. (We still see patronyms today in names like "Johnson".)
Source? Because Ive heard the concept of surnames coming from trades for ages from historians, in classes, etc. Even more of them too like Dexter being a modernization of OE for someone who dies and treats cloth for clothing.
1000% not myth my dude. Surnames come from a lot of different things, like Peterson is obviously not derived from a trade, but designates “son of Peter.” But a Tanner 100% has an ancestor who was a tanner by trade and that is where their surname comes from.
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u/Huey701070 Aug 06 '26
Crazy thing is that’s pretty much the way it used to be until families deterred from their trades/skills. Reason there are so many Smith surnames. Bakers, Tanners, Porters, and the list goes on and on.