Balto-Finnic Personal Name Suffixes
Abstract
The Balto-Finnic peoples have always formed their personal names using primarily personal name suffixes.
After Christianizing, these peoples as most other European peoples have had Christian names: the
Orthodox (Greek-Catholic) people (Karelians, Vepsians, Votes and Ingrians or Izhorians) mostly names of
Greek origin, the Roman-Catholics (from the 16th century the Lutherans) (Finns, Estonians, Livonians)
names of Latin origin. The Balto-Finnic name suffixes occur in the hypocoristic modifications of the
Christian names.
The most popular and with great probability also the oldest Balto-Finnic name suffix is -'oi' ('-ęi').
According to old documents it occurs already in the pre-Christian names. The old Balto-Finnic place name
with the suffix '-la' also consists of a personal name with the suffix '-oi' before the place name suffix '-la'. The
suffix '-oi' is originally a diminutive suffix, although it has lost its diminutive character in names. In
different Balto-Finnic languages it has preserved its primary phonetic form (in Finnish, Karelian and
Ingrian) or it developed phonetically (Votic -'oi' > '-o', Estonian '-oi' > '-o' > '-u').
In addition to '-oi' there are some other personal name suffixes which occur in different Balto-Finnic
languages: '-u', the plosive '+ s' ('-ts', '-ks', '-ps') '-ne(n)', '-uk(ka)' / '-kas', '-k(k)i', and others.
After Christianizing, these peoples as most other European peoples have had Christian names: the
Orthodox (Greek-Catholic) people (Karelians, Vepsians, Votes and Ingrians or Izhorians) mostly names of
Greek origin, the Roman-Catholics (from the 16th century the Lutherans) (Finns, Estonians, Livonians)
names of Latin origin. The Balto-Finnic name suffixes occur in the hypocoristic modifications of the
Christian names.
The most popular and with great probability also the oldest Balto-Finnic name suffix is -'oi' ('-ęi').
According to old documents it occurs already in the pre-Christian names. The old Balto-Finnic place name
with the suffix '-la' also consists of a personal name with the suffix '-oi' before the place name suffix '-la'. The
suffix '-oi' is originally a diminutive suffix, although it has lost its diminutive character in names. In
different Balto-Finnic languages it has preserved its primary phonetic form (in Finnish, Karelian and
Ingrian) or it developed phonetically (Votic -'oi' > '-o', Estonian '-oi' > '-o' > '-u').
In addition to '-oi' there are some other personal name suffixes which occur in different Balto-Finnic
languages: '-u', the plosive '+ s' ('-ts', '-ks', '-ps') '-ne(n)', '-uk(ka)' / '-kas', '-k(k)i', and others.