by Menke (guest)
10/8/2004, 1:32 AM
that Blazej has this meaning is not relevant anymore, because these meaning are often not known by the people. The reason of the existence of Blazej is to honour a saint, in this case a Saint-Blaise and often those names change under influence of their own language. Blaise is not used in the Netherlands (where i live) and that is probably because this saint had no significant meaning to us. For example, a name like John has a meaning, like all ancient names, but in the Medieval Ages nobody from the people knew the meaning anymore. They just named their child John after one of the (more than 100) saints called John. So, this surname you have to read like this: "one from the place of Blazej", thus one who came from the place where Blazej lived. It could be that Blazejew (place of Blazej) was a village, but this isn't necessary. You could see it like this: there is this guy with a farm, his name is Blazej. He dies or leaves and the farm becomes new inhabitants. This is all pre-surname. Then, someone comes with the idea of surnames for everyone, not only the noble people. This person was Napoleon (well, in Western Europe he did that). The inhabitants of the farm decide to name themselves after the farm (which has the name Blazejew, because Blazej was the first one to build the farm). Their surname becomes thus Blazejewski. Something like that must have happened. That Blazej means 'lisping' was unknown by those people, probably even by Blazej self. The people normally where kept quite ignorant by the nobles (and the church).