Onoma 47 (2012), 35-56. doi: 10.2143/ONO.47.0.3085138. © Onoma. All rights reserved. The History and Practice of the Regulations for Changing One’s Family Name in Hungary* Tamás FARKAS Introduction: a Remarkable Topic and Its Study For several reasons, the topic of official family name changes in Hun- gary merits special attention concerning the study of the relationship of names and law. First, this was the area in which the first name law regulations appeared in Hungary at the end of the 18th century, as this process was ‘the most suitable to endanger the constancy towards names and the idea of safety of law based on this’ (Megyeri-Pálffi 2007: 121). Second, family name changes represent the most complex issue in a special area of the relationship of names and law, that is, in the field of official name changes. Before 1955, officially changing one’s given name was only possible in Hungary in the case of a change of religion (Farkas 2001: 14-16), and only the expansion of the adoptable marital name types from 1952 (see Fercsik 2013) opened up the pos- sibility to change one’s marital name. In both cases, the new name had to be selected from a well-defined, independently regulated set. However, the number of family name changes has surpassed that of the above-mentioned types up until today. Third, family name changes, especially the Hungarisation (or Hungarianisation) of names, were a characteristic phenomenon in the social and onomastic history of Hungary in the 19th-20th centuries due to historical reasons and earlier ethnic relations. The number of cases in the history of official family name changes in Hungary may be estimated at around 300,000-350,000, while today there are about 2,500 cases per year (Kozma 2009). Thorough historical and socio-historical overview (Karády, Kozma 2002) as well as onomastic (Farkas 2001, 2009) and name law * This paper was supported by the János Bolyai Research Scholarship of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.