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And really, the Japanese didn't adopt the family name/given name pattern as standard until the 1870s. It would've probably made more sense for Sulu just to call himself [Something] no Hikaru, i.e. Hikaru of some clan or village.
Wow, I didn’t know that. I presumed Japanese had surnames because of Jin Sakai in Ghost of Tsushima.
 
Wow, I didn’t know that. I presumed Japanese had surnames because of Jin Sakai in Ghost of Tsushima.

Well, they did go by multiple names, but it wasn't standardized. For instance, there was the great 16th-17th century swordsman known as Miyamoto Musashi, but that's really the name of the village and province he was from. His full name and title was Shinmen Musashi-no-Kami Fujiwara no Harunobu, which essentially breaks down to "Harunobu of the Fujiwara lineage, Governor of Musashi village, vassal of Lord Shinmen." He was also known as Shinmen Takezou or Miyamoto Bennosuke, and his Buddhist name was Niten Douraku.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_name#Historical_names
Before the government formalized the naming system in 1868, Japanese personal names were fluid. Men changed their names for a variety of reasons: to signify that they had attained a higher social status, to demonstrate their allegiance to a house or clan, to show that they had succeeded to the headship of a family or company, to shed bad luck that was attached to an inauspicious name, or simply to avoid being mistaken for a neighbor with a similar name. Upper-class men often changed their names upon coming of age (genpuku), leaving behind their childhood name (which often ended with -maru) and taking on an adult name. When nobles and samurai received promotions in rank, they received new names, which might contain a syllable or character from their lord's name as a mark of favor.
 
Thanks for sharing.
That is so alien! While the article states that prominent families had their genealogy recorded in the Shinsen, it must be hard for commoners to track down their roots through the centuries if the names didn’t even stay the same after death.

If I was dropped into the past and didn’t perish quickly, at least I could track down my ancestors based on their location and surnames.

Perhaps the Na’kuhl did mess up Japanese naming conventions in Star Trek.
 
That is so alien!

I dunno... It's not so different from European naming conventions like the one represented by Leonardo da Vinci (full name Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, "Leonardo, son of Sir Piero from VInci"). Or computer pioneer Ada Lovelace, whose full name was Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace.
 
Good examples.
In my region last names were established in the early modern period and usually based around 1) profession and 2) defining physical/personality feature, and then just passed on patrilinearly.
 
In my region last names were established in the early modern period and usually based around 1) profession and 2) defining physical/personality feature, and then just passed on patrilinearly.

There have been a lot of different ways of assigning names in different cultures, but a lot of cultures have adopted Western-style surnames over the past few centuries. Though there are still a few that don't use them, like Indonesia, I think. And there are cultures that have their own naming conventions but simplify them to fit Western norms. E.g. the Islamic world, where they don't use surnames per se and are generally referred to by two of their given names, like how Saddam Hussein's real name is Saddam Hussein 'Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti, or how Siddig el Fadil/Alexander Siddig's real name is Siddig El Tahir El Fadil El Siddig Abdurrahman Mohammed Ahmed Abdel Karim El Mahdi.
 
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