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Coming to grips with the multifacetedness of bynames 47
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Summary
Coming to grips with the multifacetedness of bynames
By Silvio Brendler
Bynames have usually been studied as the preliminary stage of hereditary surnames.
Their etymology can be researched and they can more or less easily be classified according
to their motivation. Once they are etymologised and classified, they can serve as evidence,
for instance, in dialectology, local history and migration studies. There has,
furthermore, been some interest in the transformation of flexible bynames into hereditary
surnames, with the emphasis on the question how to tell a byname from a surname.
Having a closer look at bynames shows that there is more to studying bynames than just
etymologising and classifying them and finally utilising them for certain extra-onomastic
purposes. In a holistic onomastic perspective many more facets of bynames can be
observed. It is the aim of this paper to show how to come to grips with the many facets
of bynames. The suggested methods are drawn from different onomastic traditions and
some of them are recent innovations in onomastic methodology.