What does the last name implies? Sometimes maybe you wonder and ask yourselves, “What does my last name mean?” The meaning and function of the last name or surname varies from culture to culture, but there might be similarities for some certain cultures or communities. In some cultures a woman takes her husband's family name when they are married, but some other cultures she retain her father's name. Surnames or last names are started to be used in Europe since the 12th century. The main purpose of using the last name or surname was to differentiate people from one another. In this continent, third of the male population had a given name of William, Richard or John in 13^th century. To identify their uniqueness, people refer to different Williams as William the son of Andrew, so became William Anderson, William the Cook, and so on. Finally, the last names or surnames became inherited, passed from parents to children. Thus, the last names or surnames refer to etymology or genealogy of a family.

In general, most last names or surnames fall into four categories of meaning. Firstly, the last names or surnames are derived from given names such as Johnson, Williams, and Thompson which mostly refers to a male ancestor, although some of them very rarely refer to a female ancestor. The second category is occupational surnames which refer to the occupation of the name bearer such as Smith, Clark, or Wright. Beside that, the last names or surnames may also have locational or topographic meanings which are derived from the place or location that the bearer lived such as Hill, Woods, and Ford. The last category is that the last names or surnames are derived from nicknames like White, Young, and Long.