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ArchivesRe: Hrezik [Slovak] Early origins and etymology
in reply to a message by Jim
Just a shot in the dark: do you think that Hrezik might be a diminutive of Hrehor, "Gregory"? -ik can be a diminutive ending, compare Kubik, Pavlik.
I'm sure you're aware that several letters have more than one value in Slovak script, making it difficult to know the true spelling from an English text. The letters R,E,Z and I in Hrezik could all be written and pronounced two different ways, producing several permutations.
Hrezsik and Kdovicsin both have Hungarian letter combinations, but are Slavic. I wonder if the original family name was Kdovicsin, too difficult for Hungarians, and so Hrezik was adopted in its place. I think Kdovicsin looks more Ukrianian than Slovak - a Rusyn origin perhaps?
I'm sure you're aware that several letters have more than one value in Slovak script, making it difficult to know the true spelling from an English text. The letters R,E,Z and I in Hrezik could all be written and pronounced two different ways, producing several permutations.
Hrezsik and Kdovicsin both have Hungarian letter combinations, but are Slavic. I wonder if the original family name was Kdovicsin, too difficult for Hungarians, and so Hrezik was adopted in its place. I think Kdovicsin looks more Ukrianian than Slovak - a Rusyn origin perhaps?
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Replies
Thanks. I thought I'd check a couple of things you gave me some ideas on. It turned out that "a couple of things" turned into looking into 50 or 60 years of baptismal records, marrriage and death records.
It looks like the name Kdovicsin was in the village for at least 3 decades and sometime around the mid 1840s a group of them changed their name to Hrezsik. But the name Kdovicsin continued to be used in the village for at least another 30 years. So while I thought that perhaps there might have been a new Hungarian in town that "forced" the change it obviously didn't change for all of them.
There was another surname in the village, Hrehov, which is a lot closer to a derivative of Hrehor than Hrezsik is a derivative of Hrehor. I think that theory is unlikely.
I think you may be right about the Ukrainian. There was also a curious absence of the name in the confirmation records when I knew the family was there, listed as Roman Catholic. Since they weren't in the confirmation records it could be they were originally of the Eastern Rite and converted to RC. Eastern Rite are "confirmed" at birth. If they converted would they get confirmed again or would they skip that sacrament? [Rhetorical question].
Names can be frustrating.
It looks like the name Kdovicsin was in the village for at least 3 decades and sometime around the mid 1840s a group of them changed their name to Hrezsik. But the name Kdovicsin continued to be used in the village for at least another 30 years. So while I thought that perhaps there might have been a new Hungarian in town that "forced" the change it obviously didn't change for all of them.
There was another surname in the village, Hrehov, which is a lot closer to a derivative of Hrehor than Hrezsik is a derivative of Hrehor. I think that theory is unlikely.
I think you may be right about the Ukrainian. There was also a curious absence of the name in the confirmation records when I knew the family was there, listed as Roman Catholic. Since they weren't in the confirmation records it could be they were originally of the Eastern Rite and converted to RC. Eastern Rite are "confirmed" at birth. If they converted would they get confirmed again or would they skip that sacrament? [Rhetorical question].
Names can be frustrating.
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Actually, the Hrehor theory is still likely. There are usually more derivatives of a name - such as, I'm Hana, called Hanka, but my aunt sometimes calls me Hanýžka - and there are also more variants of surnames derived from a name, such as Ondra and Ondøíèek, both derived from Ondøej (all examples from Czech). So, similarly, they could have easily called themselves differently to distinguish themselves from the already existing Hrehovs.
I'm not saying it was really like that, I'm just trying to explain how Slavic languages work...
I'm not saying it was really like that, I'm just trying to explain how Slavic languages work...
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