Editing Jewish name (section)

== Surnames ==
While many surnames are associated with Jewish people in the United States, there are only three surnames rooted in ancient Jewish culture: [[Kohen]] (or Cohen), [[Levi|Levy]], and [[Jacob|Israel]]. These names originate with the [[Twelve Tribes of Israel|Israelite tribes]] which bear the same name. Variations on these names are common and most often reflect different ways of [[Transliteration|transliterating]] the Hebrew version.<ref name=":1" />

Apart from these original surnames, the surnames of Jewish people of the present have typically reflected family history and their ethnic group within the Jewish people. [[Sephardic Jews|Sephardic]] communities began to take on surnames in the [[Middle Ages]] (specifically c.10th and 11th centuries), and these surnames reflect the languages spoken by the Sephardic subset of the Jewish diaspora, including Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian. [[Ashkenazi Jews|Ashkenazi]] communities of Northern and Eastern Europe, however, did not take on surnames until later (c.14th and 15th centuries). As with many other European communities, it was not unusual for a surname of this time period to reflect patrilineal relationships (e.g. Abraham's son --> [[Abramson]], Abramsohn, etc.).<ref name=":1" /><ref>{{Cite web |date=1956-09-01 |title=Jewish Surnames Through the Ages:An Etymological History |url=https://www.commentary.org/articles/benzion-kaganoff/jewish-surnames-through-the-agesan-etymological-history/ |access-date=2024-03-03 |website=Commentary Magazine |language=en-US}}</ref>