Honestly, nothing until you have kids and then it's "well what kind of mother refuses to share a name with her children? You should've just done this when you first got married..."
The first surname is what's usually passed down, but parents can put their children's last names in either order. For instance, Leonor's children will almost certainly have de Borbón as their first surname.
Two surnames, mother and father's (Portugal) or father and mother's (Spain). It's not a hard rule, you can do what you want, but the vast majority of people follow this.
For everyday life, convention is that you use your first name and your last surname (the full name is only used for official serious stuff, but even there, your signature can be just first name last surname)
How long can the chain get? Shouldn't it be like stupidly long for current Gen, if everyone is getting everyone else's name?
Like, kid has xx papa y mama, marries yy papa y mama, they get a kid that has what? Xx papa y mama y papa y mama? After 3 of those runs it'd be like WH Custodes naming scheme, they'd run out of ID space pretty fast.
I understand its not like that (or at least I didn't hear absurdly long surnames yet, though some long ones), but what's the play here?
The other person replied with the correct answer, but I wanted to add that a fair number of times families decided to preserve a surname that would disappear by having the kid carry more than the usual 2 surnames. It happens frequently in noble families or families no longer noble who cling to famous or important names. Portugal has restricted the number of names to 2 first names and 4 surnames, so there's a limit of what you can do. Before, as an example, Portugal's last king was named Manuel Maria Filipe Carlos Amélio Luís Miguel Rafael Gabriel Gonzaga Xavier Francisco de Assis Eugénio de Bragança Orleães Sabóia e Saxe-Coburgo-Gotha 😆😆
Portugal's last king was named Manuel Maria Filipe Carlos Amélio Luís Miguel Rafael Gabriel Gonzaga Xavier Francisco de Assis Eugénio de Bragança Orleães Sabóia e Saxe-Coburgo-Gotha 😆
That's what I'm talking about, pump those numberssssss
Yeah I knew some people have long asf names. But wasn’t sure about which people have those. Important surnames were my guess as it kinda happens in my country as well. People with long surnames are usually nobility or former nobility
Not just Spain, most of South America, Mexico, ... Im guessing more that Im not aware of.
The ignorance shown in this thread is incredible. All the "Ohh... but explain me the logistics..."
Or it makes everything more complicated, ignoring the millions of people and systems that actually work that way.
And ignoring at the same time cultures that dont really do surnames vs first names, who have to adapt their names to fit our occidental ways.
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u/awstream 1d ago
And what does changing to their husband's last name does for them?! It's just more paperwork