Surname
-
To name or call by an appellation added to the original name;to give a surname to.Another shall subscribe with his hand unto the Lord, and surnamehimself by the name of Israel. Isa. xliv. 5.And Simon he surnamed Peter. Mark iii. 16.
-
A family name that is generally passed down from generation to generation (via males of the family in Western culture). Women, traditionally (but not quite so much these days) often adopt the surname of the man they marry.
In modern culture it's fine for a male to adopt the females surname (though not that common), for couples to hyphenate their existing surnames into a new surname eg. if mary jones marries john smith they may join their surnames to be jones-smith or... possibly, it's fine to just create a whole new name (also not that common). Most commonly it is fine for each person to keep their own surnames and then fight when the children come along as to whose surname the children will get.
-
The last name in a pair of names, used mainly for people's names.
-
your last name
-
the name that you share with other members of your family; last name:
-
A hereditary name common to all members of a family, as distinct from a given name.
Explore More Definitions
Browse our collection of 300,000+ community-written definitions