Hi. I know that in Spain (and many Latin American countries for that matter)use both their father and mother's surnames, but is this obligatory? Is it okay to have Spanish documents with just ones' maiden name? I know where even the married last name is added on, like de SMITH, for example, which is a bit much.

Hi!

It's not mandatory if you only have one. However, most of the people have both surnames mother's + father's or father's + mother's.

This tradition dates back to the Middle Ages. Christians used one surname only; but when the Inquisition started the ethnic cleansing after the massive deportation everybody had to use both surenames.

As far as I know it is mandatory for every Spanish citizen to have two last names. I have never met anyone in forty years having only one. Even American citizens, when they naturalized Spanish use their mother's maiden surname as their second last name, I have a couple of friends in this case.

One of the last names come from father's first surname and the other from mother's. The current laws allow parents to decide the sequence (i.e. father's + mother's, or viceversa). This is only since a decade ago or so, before the father's was compulsory first, and still the majority of population have them this way.

Women don't change their names when married. The added "de" (as "de Smith" in ceb's example) is an old use and was just for social purposes, never in public documents. Nowadays, you will find a few women that name themselves that way, only very elder people.

In day-to-day, we use to shorten our names and commonly use only the first surname, but not for official purposes. For instance, our former President of the Government was known as Jose M. Aznar, but his full name is Jose M Aznar Lopez. In some cases, when the first surname is very common, then the second surname is used to shorten. The example of this case is our current P of G, whose full name is Jose L. Rodriguez Zapatero, being known as Zapatero, rather than Rodriguez.

I am a US citizen with legal residency in Spain. On all official documents, including my tarjeta de residencia and my driver's license, I only have one last name.

Also, I am registered as a self-employed worker (autónoma) and have only used one last name. It has never been a problem, albeit a bit awkward to explain at first. However, with all of the immigration to Spain recently, the different offices are getting used to dealing with foreigners with only one last name!

Using my mother's maiden name on official documents here in Spain would only confuse the matter since, in order to get my residency here in Spain, I had to hand in copies of many official documents from the USA (birth certificate, passport, etc) none of which lists my mother's maiden name as part of my legal last name.

If you ever become a Spanish citizen (no legal resident, no tourist visa owner, no refugee status owner,...), then you will have to make a second last name up. And you will be suggested to use your mother's maiden name.

Amleth writes: Interesting explanation: I hadn't heard about the Inquisition relationship before

Spain: it is generally accepted that the Father's surname goes first and the Mother's after: Federico Garcia Lorca is the son of Senor Garcia and Senora Lorca. Rodriguez Zapatero is son of Senor Rodriguez and Senora Zapatero. He should be addressed as Senor Rodriguez or Rodriguez Zapatero, not just Zapatero, although many Spanish people call him Zapatero, maybe because a Zapatero is a Cobbler and those who call him that do so as a 'put down.'

Confusing?? In some latin American countries the order is reversed. The first surname is the Mother's maiden name; the second is the father's.

When I was preparing my Papers prior to getting married in Madrid, some of the people involved (Clergy?) assumed that because I had just one surname I must be illegitimate.

LOL -

Actually, I think they call him "Zapatero" because "Rodriguez" is a very common surname in the Spanish speaking world. So using "Zapatero"really stands out of the crowd and makes easier to know you are talking about the president. Think "Rodriguez" in Spain might be as common as "Smith" or "Johnson" in the U.S. And having "Zapatero" for surname won't be so bad that people will use it to put you down. It is like having "Carpenter" as last name in the U.S.

It would be interesting to know what countries in Latinamerica go the opposite way as to lastnames, first mom's then dad's. Never heard of that before.

i have been told a few times that a Spaniard could use the last names of multiple generations, for example "Rey Fernandez Pico........" as far back as they could remember. Has anyone else ever heard of this? The inquisition thing was interesting....thanks.

TJ

Short answer is: No, Spaniards have two and only two surnames, one coming from mother's and the other from father's.

There are nuances to the above said.

One person can officially join their two surnames, creating a compound surname. This is usually done by people who:
- has a very common first surname like Fernandez, Lopez, Rodriguez... and a not so usual second one, and want the latter to be propagated to their children.
- has the time and the money to do the paperwork in the Ministry of Justice.
In this case, the compound surname is made by joining both and hyphenating them.

Example: Mr. Juan Fernandez Pico (son of Juan Fernandez Whatever) is in this situation. He can legally change his name to Juan Fernandez-Pico Whatever (the father's second surname is now taken as second surname, as we all have to have two surnames) and all his descendants will inherit Fernandez-Pico as surname. This avoids the Pico to be lost.

In some other cases, a surname is not a single word, but it is not a compound, just a multi-word surname, like "Ruiz de la Prada", for instance (kind of the Dutch "Van der Whatever")