From: David Zincavage < > 
Subject: [LITHUANIA-L] Determining ethnicity of surnames, cont. 
Date: Fri, 02 Jan 1998 08:05:41 -0500 (EST) 


Alright, let's finish this.

In Lithuania, Prof. Vanagas finds 50 persons named TOLOC~KA, 59 TALAC~KA.
Rymut, quoted by Hoffman, finds 762 in Poland. The learned authorities
offer _tol/k_ "sense," "reason" and the Russian _toloch_ "to pound," "to
beat" as possible roots. Myself, I'd incline to a personal name, like
Anatole as the root, or possibly an archaic Slavic names like Toligniew
or Tolisl/aw. Among the nobility, we find Toloczkos bearing a variation of
the POBOG arms, and a princely family of unknown arms also called Bujnicki
recorded in the district of Mohilew in 1500. There is also a Tol/oczkowicz
family with individual arms and a Tol/oczynski bearing arms DRUCK. The
noble families seem to be from Lithuania.

Lithuania: 16 Zaloga, 9 Zalaga. Vanagas derives it from the same thing in
Ruthenian, which I don't find very helpful. Rymut/Hoffman says there are
1384 in Poland, gives _zal/oga_ meaning (1) "pleat", (2) "ambush,"
"garrison," "crew." We find one noble ZAL/OGA family, bearing Arms Pol/
ORL/A, first recorded 1560.

Most of these surnames: Hulewicz, Iwaszko, Toloczko have distinctly
Ruthenian, probably Belarussian, roots. But a Belarussian origin some
centuries earlier does not prevent a family from being thoroughly Lithuanian
or Polish in self-identification by 1900. In 1800, neither the Lithuanian
or Belarussian alternative identities yet meaningfully existed.

> In most cases, one cannot definitely differentiate between Polish,
> Lithuanian, and Belorussian surnames. Commonly in pre-1868 records,
>names are written in Polish, and consequently are in Polish forms.
>Lithuanian lords of the 15th century received Christian names, like
>Stanisl/aw, and those names often became patrnymic surnames, like
>Stankiewicz.
> Circa 1985, there was one Hulevic~ius in Lithuania, in S~venc~ioneliai.
> There were 518 Hulewicz-es in Poland, according to Rymut. Gulewicz
>is an alternative spelling. The Polish "g" turns to "h" in Russian,
>Belorussian, and Ukrainian. It's a patronymic, but I personally
>cannot identify the root. I'm inclined to reject the _gula_ "bump,"
>_gulac_ "to revel" explanations suggested by the authorities. I
>strongly suspect the root is a diminutive of some standard Christian
>name. For one reason, it is a surname well represented by noble
>families. The armorials list twelve seemingly different HULIEWICZ
>families bearing: NAL/E~Z', NOWINA, SZELIGA, WIENIAWA, individual
>arms, or unspecified arms. The "h" suggests that all these families
>were of Ruthenian (i.e. White Russian or Ukrainian) origin.
> Iwaszko would be spelled IVAS~KA or YVAS~KA or IVAS~KIS or IVAS~KIS
> in contemporary Lithuania. There are about 60 of them. There are 1651
> Iwaszko-s in Poland. The root is _Ivan_ = John. The root is clearly
> Ruthenian. Boniecki lists one noble family of the IWASZKO from the
>district of Kalvarija in SW Lithuania. He doesn't give their arms,
>but informs us that they were recorded by 1450. It is not hard to
>picture IWASZKIEWICZ/ IWASZKOWICZ decaying into IWASZKO. There are 8
>noble families mentioned of those names, including some from
>Lithuania: arms LIS, GOZDAWA, JASTRE~BIEC, a variant of POGONIA,
>TRA~BY, and arms unknown.
> Stankiewicz, appearing as STANKAVIC~IUS, STANKEVIC~IUS, STANKIS,
>STANKIUS, & STANKUS is very common in Lithuania. More than 1600.
>There are also 19826 in Poland. Five noble famlies: BONCZA, MOGIL/A,
>WADWICZ, individual and unknown.
> My limit is 3 per evening.
> DZ
> > Although 3 of my 4 grandparents were born in the Vilna / Wilno /
> >Vilnius area, I had assumed that they were of Polish decent because
> >they spoke Polish. However, after reading some of the posts, I am
> >thinking that maybe this isn't so.
> > Are the names Hulewicz, Toloczko, Stankiewicz, Iwaszko and Zaloga,
> > Polish or some other nationality?
> > Thanks for you help.
> > Jan Rydzon