Why do they end in
-ov,
-ev and
-sky? I thought those were strictly Russian surname styles? Same goes for Macedonians. Why not the south Slavic
-ich? Why aren't they unique? I thought Bulgarians had a unique culture, separate form the rest of the Slavs. Like how Ukrainians have
-enko, Czechs have
-chek and Poles have
yk?
because '-ich' is serbian, croats usually have strange slavo-latin last names like
gotovina,
tudjman, and
prsoi know this isn't what you're topic's about but i'm getting there.
most slavs have random last names, others have ones which signify possession, and others ones that signify tribal kinship. it all depends on the type of society the slavic group was.
my hypothesis would be that due to bulgarians and russians being traditionally both patriarchal serfdom societies, owning other people was commonplace and so the '-ev', '-ov' suffixs for surnames displayed ownership by the male founder of the family.
while the ukranian 'enko' is more of a descriptor, not expressing ownership, but rather a description of the 'sort' of person one is (via through the ancestrial name). and this might reflect the more anarchical and free nature of early ukrainian society (indeed they were the first place in the world to have an anarchist state)
a comparison in english between the two would be,
____ John's (Russian)
____ John-like (Ukrainian)
meanwhile the serbian '-ich' suffix is also a descriptor, however in a more specific sense. literally meaning 'the little one', thus no ownership, rather kinship (reincarnation) is alluded to here. this illustrates the tribal environment of the serb society, where children were often seen as simply spiritual rebirths of past ancestors.
thus the english equivalent would make,
_____ Little John (Serbian)
poles predominantly have
-sky also, btw, which is a direct adjective very similar to -enko but less archaic.
______ Johnish (Polish)
Hope this wasn't too confusing and even a little insightful ;D