ossnhughiePO Top Contributor & Patron
Joined: 19 Sep 2010
Replies: 359
Location: Massachusetts, USABack to top |
Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2015 8:54 pm
Post subject: Names Jozefata and Ignacy Anastazy
Hello all,
I know there are no absolutes in name origins but one of the great translators here on PO, Elzbieta. Translated a record for me and also previous translated records have produced certain names that I have wondered the origins or possibly if my roots are more diverse than I thought.
Let me start with what prompted this question. I was talking to a priest friend of mine who is a genealogy buff in his own right and spent some time in a Greek catholic monastery in California that was an order that originated in the Ukraine. So when I was showing him some of my translated marriages and birth records he thought some of the names might imply possible Ruthenian or even Russian ancestry in the distant past. Mind you he said from the sound they sounded to less Polish more Eastern Slavic, but said he couldn't be sure. I know the "Old Commonwealth" had many groups, and their was a lot of mixture of the cultures within it and their are likely no pure ethnic Poles, Lithuanians etc.
Here are some of the names of folks he thought could be Eastern rite/Orthodox backgrounds:
(Most of the surnames seem typically Polish it's the Christian names he was looking at)
-Ignacy Anastazy Subotowicz
-Jozefata Narkiewicz
-Konstanty Szymkiewicz
So do any of you agree with his opinion or do you think this is not even close. As I said he made no claim of DEEP knowledge just general, so take it easy of the good Reverend Father 
Hugh
_________________
Litwo! Ojczyzno moja! ty jesteś jak zdrowie;
Ile cię trzeba cenić, ten tylko się dowie, Kto cię stracił.
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PhilipPO Top Contributor
Joined: 03 Mar 2014
Replies: 117
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Posted: Sat Jul 04, 2015 4:42 am
Post subject:
Hi Hugh,
In my personal opinion it's always more complicated than it seems.
As you also said, the Polish history, especially the Commonwealth period, but even later, it was mixture of so many different cultures that today probably we can't understand as it was in reality, in fact, people at the time spoke so many languages (polish, russian, yiddish, german and many other dialects) and there were many cultural groups in different areas of Poland, Lithuania, Ukraine and part of Russia.
It means that associating surnames to religious sects it's not a good way to start from, in my opinion.
I'm not saying that this Eastern Orthodox priest is wrong, but if you want to do some good genealogical research what really matters are certificates and documents. From those, you will understand their cultural background. Especially because each religious group in Poland had their own archives (Catholics, Protestants, Jews and even Greek Orthodox).
But often, same surnames were used by different cultural groups! This complicates everything! 
But generally speaking every surname that ends in -Wicz is Patronymic: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_family_name_affixes
And this is something that was common all over Europe!
These are the distributions of these surnames in today's Poland
- Subotowicz: https://nazwiska-polskie.pl/Subotowicz
But maybe it's not spelled correctly!
- Narkiewicz: https://nazwiska-polskie.pl/Narkiewicz
- Szymkiewicz: https://nazwiska-polskie.pl/Szymkiewicz
In conclusion I would suggest you not to concentrate too much on a specific path but be open to more possibilities.
I hope this could be somehow useful!
Philip
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ossnhughiePO Top Contributor & Patron
Joined: 19 Sep 2010
Replies: 359
Location: Massachusetts, USABack to top |
Posted: Sat Jul 04, 2015 9:04 am
Post subject:
Thanks Philip for your response and providing he useful and interesting links. My priest friend (who is Roman Catholic w/eastern rite faculties) pretty much concurs with what you say; that given the complex ethnic picture of the area that only hard documents will tell the tale. As of yet I have found all my old records (dating back to 1804) as being Roman Catholic records, although if I hit a roadblock I will probably look into Greek Catholic metric books also. I will say one thing for Polish genealogy, it;s a very interesting area to difg into.
Dziekuje,
Hugh
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