Spanish Names

Spanish Names posts walk through first names and surnames in Spain, including the regional spellings in Catalan, Basque and Galician. Articles look at the most common first names of recent decades like Lucia, Sofia, Hugo and Martin, the long Catholic naming tradition that gave rise to compound forms like Maria del Carmen and Jose Luis, the use of two surnames (paternal first, then maternal) on official documents, the long noble de prefix that survives in some old families and the way Latin American immigration has shifted the lists in recent census data.