RUSSIAN SURNAMES IN CANADA A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of craduate Studies and Research University of Manitoba In PartÍal- Fuffi flment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts by !fí11iam Moodrey 1983 RUS S IAN SURNAME S IN CANADA BY WlI-LIA}f MOODREY A tllcsis subn]ilted to t)ic FacLrlty ol GradLrate StLldies ol lhc Ur)i\ùrsit)'ol ltla¡litoba iD pa:tial Iìrlftll¡trent of tlte reqLrirenrents of the clcgrce o1' }TASTER OF ARTS o 1983 Pe¡rnissior has been grarìtr'd to tlte LIBIìARY OIr THE UNIVER- SITY Ot: l\'IANlTOBA to Icnd o¡ sclJ copies of thìs tJìesis. to thc NATIONAL LIBRARY OF CANADA to nricrofilnr tiris tlìesis ârìd to lend o¡ selì copies of the fllm. and UNIVERSITY I'llCROFlLltlS to publish an abstract ol thrs thesjs, The aLrthor reserves other publication nghts, and neillìer the thcsis nor extensive cxtracts lrorìl jt nta)'bc prjntcd or otlìer- *'ìse reproduced without tlìe author's written pernrission. l- ABB REVIATI ONS 1. Cities and Towns in canada Abbreviations of cíties and tovrns where Russian sur- names were l-ocated via various tèlephone directories (dat- ing 1969-1976 from al-l across Canada) , are gíven in the order generally of West to East. Other places not abbre- viated ín the inventory have been wrítten in full-. a - area Àrms.B.C. Armslrong B. C. ê? E1lz ê Grank Forks B. C. Brand. Brandon Ham. H ami l- ton Ca19, Cal-gary Kamp, Kamp loop s Camp , R. C ampbe l1 Kel-, Ke lov¿na River Kit-Ter; Kitimat-Terrace Can, Canora Sask. Kit-Wat.. Ki tcliene r-Wate rloo Cas tlegar Leth , Le thb ri dge Crest. Creston Lond. London Ont. Dart-Hax. Ðartmouth - Med. Hat Medicine Hat Halifax Mont. Mon tre a 1 Edm, Edmonton t\aK. Nakusp B. C. Mrs , Gattinger N an aimo Nan aimo of Selkirk Col-- Nels . Ne l son lege in Cas tle- N,Batt. North Battleford gar B, C. Niag. F. Naigara Falls .Ia Ott . -Hu11 Ot¿avra-HuI l St.Cath. St. catherines Pent. Pent i cton Sudb. S udbury P. AIb . Port Alberni TH. Thunder Bay ÞÞ Peace River Thrms . Thrums B. C. Que . C. Quebec City Tor. Toronto Re g1n a Van . Van couve r S àlm. Arm . Sal-mon Arm Vi ct.,, Vi-ctoria Sask. S ask atoon Vern. Ve rnon Selkirk Man. wps . trÍínnipeg Sloc, Slocan B. C. Yorkt, York ton c c 1^^ south Slocan B. C. 2, Provinces A1ta, Alberta OnÈ. ontario B. c. British columbia Que. Quebe c Man, Idtanitoba Sask S ask at chewan N. S. Nova S cotia 3. Languaggs. Arab . Arab i c Cz,-Sl-. Czechoslovakian Arm. Armen i an Eng. English Bu19 . Bulgari an Fr. French B. Ru Byelo- (White ) Gen . Slav. GeneraÌ Slavic Russ ian Ger. German Chin, Chinese Gk. Greek Croat i an Heb. Hebrew czech Hung. Hungarian ra1 Lat. Latin Sl-av. S lavic l,atv. Latvi an S l ovak S lovakian Li thuan i an S l- oven S lovenian Polish -L',art. T artar Scottish Turk i l'urKr-c Serbian Ukr. Ukrainian Serb-c. Serbo-Croatian 4. Accents l-str acc . first syllable accent 2nd, syf . acc. second syllable accent 3rd. sy1. third sy1lable accent 4rh. syl . acc. fourth sy11ab1e accent 5rh. syl. acc. fi.fth syllable accent 5. Çategories Bapt n. baptismal of christian name N ACJ< n i ckn ame Occ. n. occupational name Patr. n patronymic name Ðl pJ-ace name 6, Primary Sources and P References for this Work In giving the definitions of these abbreviations on- ly the name of the author, and the title of the worl< are given. For a more detailed mention of each work - place publíshed, publisher, year etc., see the biblography found r_v at the end of this studv under the títle Primary Sources, Primary References, and Secondary References for this S tudy . Bens Benson, M. Ðictionary of Russian Personal Names with a Guide to Stress and Morphology. DaI Dal', V,I. To]kovy j sl-ovar Zivogo velikorus- skogo jazyka. (defíning Dictionary of the Great-Russian Language) xcatt. cattinger's list of Russian Surnames, Selkirk Col-lege, castlegar, B.C. (approximately 250) Ka-L rn Kalinovich, M,Ia Rus sko-ukrainski i s lovar', (Rus s ian-Ukraini an Dictionary) MUI l- Mu11er, V. K. Anglo-russkii slovarr. ( English- Russian Dictionary) Petrovsk. PeÈrovskij, N.Ä. Slovar russkikh lichny\h i- mén. (A Dictionary of Russian Personal Names) Smírn Smirnickyj , A.I Russko-ang 1i'i skii slovar' (A Russian-English Dictionary) Smi th Smith, Elsdon C. New Dictíonary of Americgq Family Names. Smi th- îre as ury Smith, E1sdon C. Treasury of Name Lore. St.CLair St. Clair-Sobe11, James. rlsome Remarks on the Pronunciation of Russian Surnames in the Eng- glish Speaking World" Three Papers in S lavon- ic Studies. St.CLair-Carls St. Cfair-Sobell, .fames, and lrína Carl-- son. The Structure of Russian Surnames . The Canadian Sl-avonic P âDe rs Tarn. Gerus-Tarnawecky , I. Anthroponvmy in the Pomian- yk of Ho éðe of 1484 tel.Dir. Telephone Directories (from across Canada ranging from the dates 1969 - L976'). For abbrevi- ations of the cities see the title under ÄÞbrevi- ations - Cities and Towns in Canada. Unb. Unbegaun, Borrs U. Russlan surnames. Vasm. Fasmerf M. Etvmo 1oqÍ ðe sk i 'i s lovar' russkoqo ia- zyka, (Etymological- Dictionary of the Russian Language ) Þ¡imary Sources are marked with an asterisk. TABLE OF CONTENTS ID-^^ sYU ABS TRACT """.' vi Tal¡ 1e f Alphabetical- Order Used in This Thesis viii Table If Transliteration SysÈems of the Russian Al phabe t ......'. x CHAPTER T Introductiôn ... 1 a) , Aim and Scope of SÈudy 3 b) Method of Procedure ,. 4 c) Present State of Research 6 d) A Note on Surnames in General 74 e) The Russian Canadians 18 )_) Characteristics of Russían Surnames . 26 e) A Note of Surname Changes 33 CHAPTER TT An Inventory of Russian Surnames in Canada 35 CHAPTER III Concl-us íon 255 Bibliography .,,.26I APPENDIX A Index of Surnames Possibly Sl-avic and As yet to be Explained ..., .,.,290 APPENDIX B References on Names in General ...,293 vl- ABS TRACT To date no collection or anafysis of Russian sur- names in Canada has been made. Al-though Canadians of Russian ancestiy make up stil1 another unique facet of our multicutrtural and bilingual country, the amount of material on the Russian ethnic aroup in general, and Russian surnames in particular, is minimal. It is with this in mind that this work is presented. The purpose of this the si-s jsto investigate Russian surnanes in Canada. The aims are: l-, to make as complete a collection of Russian surnames ín Canada as possible¡ 2. to analyze each surname stem as to meaning on the synchronic leve1, to give lhe prevalent ac- cent hrhere possible, to list the places where it:+'s found, to give the variations in spelling, and give the type of categoryi 3. to make an ínvenlory in alphabetical order of the Russian surnames that are explaíned. Al-1 remaining surnames appearing to be possibly Slav- ic, but whose stems are unexplained have been put int.o the l\ppendíx under the titl-e of "Index of Surnames Possibly 'Slavic but as Yet to be Explained. " vii over 2000 surnames were collected and scrutínized. As a background for this studyr there is also giv- en a note on Russian Canadians and the characteristics of Russian surnames. The conlusion summarizes the findings. TAB],E I v11l Alphabetical order Used in Thís Thesis A B C D Fì F.G H I ,J K L M N O P (Q) * R S T U V W (X) * Y Z1 H and W are rarely used to begin Russian surnames, and fíkewise are hardl-y found in the surnames themselves. But a few cases of the H and W occur probably because Èo some ears the Russian K (Kah) and X (Khah) and I (ceh) may have been spoken softly and interpreted lightly, thus to the ear giving the rHah' sound, and the Russian B (Veh) may have been inÈerpreted tightly lhus gíving the rWhehr sound, especially as it appears visually that no one transliteration system of the Russian letters into English and French equivalent sounds ¡vas officially for- mulated for consistency sake, or accepted on a broad ba- sis, or used, by various officiafs (or immigration ofi. ficers) . To go further it is interesting to note that the sounds of some Russian letters such as X (Zl1eln) , v ( oo), u (rseh), q (cheh), rl (shah), r¡ (shchah), bt (i âs in hit), ro (Joo), and g (Jah) were trans- *Nol Russían surnames have been found in Canada thus far (though a few may exist) beginning with the letters ç and [, and only a f ew have been found i,rith H or W. l-iterated ín the Latin alphabet in a variety of v/ays rx instead of one fixed letter design. * A sample of the trans l ite rat.íons that \,rere used to possibly represent the Russian letters on the previous page, plus remain- ing RusÈian l-etters of the \,rhoIe alphabet, is given in Table I1. *It should be emphasized that "...surnames under- go change or deformation ín the transliterative process simply..because no .unÍversa11y accepted system of trans- literat.ion has yet developed, second, the Cyrillic a1- phabeÈ has more graphemes than'the tralj-n. alphabet and Eome of them do not have a corresponding equivalent in English, Third, the attempt by some transliterators to g.ive a phonetíca1 transcríption of surnames added to the transliÈerative probfem by inÈroducing different cLusters for the same consonantsrr A.