For many centuries, the presence of a surname indicated that a person belongs to a noble estate. It is believed that noble citizens of Veliky Novgorod were the first in Russia to acquire hereditary family names.
During the XIV-XV centuries, the boyars and princes of the Russian lands also began to take family surnames formed from the name of their land holdings. So there appeared Shuisky, Obolensky, Vyazemsky, Tver, Meshchersky, etc.
The science of the origin of surnames
Kuzmin, Petrov, Begichev, Lanskoy and other generic names today are studied by anthroponymy. This section of linguistics examines the appearance and evolution of the proper names that identify a person. According to anthroponymy, Russian surnames were formed using the suffixes: -sk-, -ov-, -ev-, -in-.
Thus, already at the first acquaintance with a person, one can judge about his origin and nationality. The surname Kuzmin, for example, indicates that we have Russian. However, anthroponymy is not limited only to the study of the formation of types of proper names, it also studies their occurrence.
Baptismal names
After the adoption of Orthodoxy by Kievan Rus in 988 at baptism, all infants received Christian names, as a rule, in honor of a saint. If we talk about the origin of the surname Kuzmin, then it is based on the church name Cosma, which in Greek means "creation, order, peace."
According to church doctrine, St. Cosmas of Yakhroma and Rev. Cosmas of Mayum are patrons of boys with similar names. Later, Greek Cosmas Russified, turning into Kuzma. And since the word ends in a vowel, the generic name derived from it is formed using the suffix -in-. Such is the brief history of the origin of the surname Kuzmin.
Famous representatives
It is assumed that the founder of the Kuzmin family was a native of a privileged class. What is this hypothesis based on? Based on anthroponymic research data. So, representatives of the social elite or families that enjoyed great authority in any locality received surnames that were formed from full, not diminutive, names.
In evidence, one can cite the genealogies of the most ancient boyar clans, approved in 1686. They include, for example, the Kuzmins-Karavaevs and simply Kuzmins. Thus, the assumption mentioned above has a foundation.
Nowadays, there are also quite a few people who bear the surname Kuzmin, whose origin we examined. Surely one of them will be found among your friends. And if not, then the name of the famous Russian singer and composer Vladimir Kuzmin is certainly familiar to everyone.