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Old 21-07-21, 18:45
monicaregister monicaregister is offline
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Default Name change

A friend of mine whos also from el salvador has a name and surname in spanish. Shes also mestizo, but what doesnt make sense is this. If shes biracial, then why does she have a european name if shes not 100% european then? What happened to the other half? Like 1000 years ago the only people living in el salvador were native americans and they didnt speak spanish and were instead speaking nahuatl, lenca, maybe quiche, ect... If someone is biracial and yet have a european name and surname, what happened to the other half? If theyre biracial, then who were their relatives like 700 years ago if native americans were the only ones in el salvador and european settlers from spain had not come yet to el salvador until 1524? 700 years ago it would have been 1321. She wants to legally change her entire name to what her ancestors were like 700 years ago because she believes that they were originally native americans but doesnt know in what language their names were originally in? Nahuatl, lenca, quiche, ect... If not genealogists, then who can help her with this??
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Old 21-07-21, 19:13
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kiterunner kiterunner is online now
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There could be many different reasons for that, and I wouldn't say that it doesn't make sense that she has a European name.

According to the Wikipedia entry on Mestizos in El Salvador (link below), a lot of marriages took place between Spanish men and Native American women. So the Spanish men would have given their children Spanish names and that is probably the reason for what you are asking about.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mestizo#Central_America

I think your friend should just choose a name that she likes and change her name to that. She could easily have ancestors from more than one indigenous group, not just one. It is very unlikely that she would ever manage to trace her Native American ancestors back as far as 700 years.
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Old 21-07-21, 19:22
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Seven hundred years ago, in this country, peoples names were different from today. They often did not have second names, or they might change those names several times over a lifetime.

A lot of buildings in England were altered to what the architects thought they should have looked like many centuries ago. The results are not happy.

Your friend might contact a linguist or a historian, but any name she chooses will almost certainly be inauthentic. Much better to find a native female relation with a native name who she admires and respects and use that.
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Old 21-07-21, 19:31
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If your friend takes a DNA test with Ancestry.com, the "ethnicity estimate" currently includes 2 regions for El Salvador: Eastern El Salvador and Western El Salvador, so it might give her a very rough idea of where her ancestors came from, but only a very rough idea. It is possible that in the future, Ancestry will be able to break it down into smaller populations. You could look at other reputable DNA testing companies (23 and Me, My Heritage, Family Tree DNA) and see whether any of them are better for El Salvador.
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Old 21-07-21, 20:38
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Your friend can't change her name to match the name of all her ancestors though. 700 years ago her ancestors would have thousands of different names, some will be Spanish (the Spanish ancestors would be living in Spain at that date) and some will be native Americans or maybe from other places you are not aware of.

I agree with Kiterunner - your friend should just pick a name she likes for whatever reason. 20 generations ago an individual would have over a million ancestors (that's a lot of different names to choose from, even allowing for cousin marriages etc).
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