onomastics

Onomastics is the scholarly study of names, their origins, meanings, use, and social significance. It covers proper names such as personal names (anthroponyms), place names (toponyms), and other name forms, and analyzes how names arise, change, and migrate across languages and cultures. The field often distinguishes between subfields such as anthroponymy, which concerns given names and surnames; toponymy, which studies geographic names; and hydronymy, the study of names of bodies of water. Some researchers also examine biblionyms (names of books or publications) and corporate or brand names as part of onomastic inquiry.

The core concerns of onomastics include etymology, morphology, phonology, and semantics of names, as well as their social uses, prestige, and identity associations. Researchers consider how names reflect linguistic contact, migration, religion, ethnicity, gender, and political power. They also examine naming practices, forms of address, nicknames, naming rituals, and the processes by which new names are created, borrowed, adapted, or abandoned.

Methods combine linguistic analysis with historical and cultural research. Data sources include archival records, church and civil registries, maps, literature, inscriptions, and modern databases. Quantitative approaches, geographic information systems, and corpus studies help map distribution, variation, and patterns of naming across time and space.

Historically, onomastics has roots in classical scholarship and evolves through modern linguistics, anthropology, and historical studies. It has practical applications in genealogy, linguistics, cultural history, urban planning, and branding, while also engaging debates about endonyms and exonyms, identity, and political sensitivity in naming practices.