On name change

Abstract

This study is based on the research of certain documents on name change (laws, archive documents, Official Gazettes issued between 1895–1945). The aim is to clarify the reasons why such onomastic amendments were requested. Thus, the paper is focused particularly on the applications for name change, not on how they were solved. Name change was requested by Romanian citizens and by other inhabitants on the Romanian territory. The study contains a summary of the evolution of the legal framework which allowed the name changes to be made, along with the underlying motivations and procedures. In general, name change applications are directly related to the features of different historical events and only indirectly to the inhabitants’ citizenship and religion. The examples investigated are relevant: the examination of all the documents on name change issued during the aforementioned period enabled the author to obtain a faithful image of the extent of this phenomenon in relation to ethnicity. Upon processing the results, one can see that the reasons behind name change were multiple, especially social, cultural and political.