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Anybody who has ever wondered about the origin of a family name will find the answer in this new dictionary, which explains the origin and meaning of all the common surnames in the English-speaking world, together with many other rarer English names and foreign names. It also gives information, where possible, about their history and distribution, and about some of the notable people who have borne them. The dictionary is based on extensive study of the literature of surname research in all the major European languages. Specialist consultants for particular areas, including the Celtic languages, Iberian languages, and Jewish names, have provided much information not previously available. This title is also announced in the Oxford General Books catalogue for Autumn 1988.

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Library Journal Review

Unlike most other surname dictionaries that focus on specific nationalities, this work's 100,000 entries come from throughout Europe, Australia, North America, and the British Isles. Names are treated as a cultural and linguistic phenomenon and chosen on the principal of frequency and on the basis of available information. The methodology of selection, classification of names, and background for each nationality as well as Jewish family names are thoroughly covered in the introduction. The most common spelling of a name is listed in an alphabetical arrangement, with variant spellings in ``nested groups'' under main entries. An index leads the user to variant spellings within entries. A surname's derivation, name type, meaning, noncognate equivalents, and earliest use are typically provided. This scholarly work, the most comprehensive surname dictionary to date, will be welcome in most public and academic libraries. Stanley P. Hodge, Ball State Univ. Lib., Muncie, Ind. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

CHOICE Review

Surnames of the English-speaking world--the British Isles, Europe, and elsewhere (India, Pakistan, China, and Japan to be in a later edition)--are included in the approximately 10,000 entry names. Prime criteria for selection were frequency (really common surnames even though little information about them), and informativeness (relatively rare names but with "reasonable facts"). The selection method was by an international survey of telephone directories. Any name with a frequency of more than 50 subscribers resulted in a dictionary entry. The informative introduction includes a typology of surnames and a survey of national and cultural groups. The format of the name entries is uniform. Meanings are obvious when one reads them with the aid of the list of abbreviations. A contents list would have been helpful to find such features as the abbreviations and when looking for such parts of the introduction as the "Organization of Entries" without having to run through the pages. At the back of the book a 200-plus page list records all the names in the book (about 60,000), whether a main entry or included as a variant, cognate, etc. This list, the text says, should be consulted; its location should be signaled by contents page. Probably the most inclusive surname dictionary available not limited to the names of a particular country, this would be a welcome addition to academic collections at any level and to public and special libraries serving genealogists, social historians, historical linguists, family historians, demographers, etc. -V. L. Close, Dartmouth College

Notas de autor provistas por Syndetics

Patrick Hanks is a Research Fellow in the Department of English Language and Literature at the University of Birmingham. Both he and Flavia Hodges worked from 1980 until 1983 in the Department of Language and Linguistics at the University of Essex, where much of the research for this book was carried out.