Editing Slave name

{{distinguish|Slavic name}}
{{short description|Name given to an enslaved person}}
{{Slavery}}
A '''slave name''' is the [[personal name]] given by others to an [[Slavery|enslaved]] person, or a name inherited from enslaved ancestors. 

== Ancient Rome==
{{See also|Slavery in the Roman Empire}}
In [[Rome]], slaves were given a single name by their owner. A slave who was [[Manumission|freed]] might keep their slave name and adopt the former owner's name as a [[praenomen]] and [[Roman naming conventions|nomen]]. As an example, one historian says that "a man named Publius Larcius freed a male slave named Nicia, who was then called Publius Larcius Nicia."<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.vroma.org/~bmcmanus/roman_names.html |title=Roman Nomenclature |author=<!--Not stated--> |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201119170338/http://www.vroma.org/~bmcmanus/roman_names.html |website=vroma.org |archive-date=November 19, 2020 |access-date=November 29, 2024 }}</ref>

Historian [[Harold Whetstone Johnston]] writes of instances in which a slave's former owner chose to ignore custom and simply chose a name for the [[freedman]].<ref>{{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20030714161452/http://www.forumromanum.org/life/johnston_2.html#60 Johnson, Harold Whetstone; Johnston, Mary; Names of Freedmen; 1903, 1932; forumromanum.org]}}</ref>

== Middle East ==
{{See also|History of slavery in the Muslim world}}

By Islamic law, non-Muslim foreigners ([[kafir]]) were by definition legitimate targets for enslavement, since the Muslim world of [[Dar al-islam|dar al-Islam]] was by definition at war with the non-Muslim world of [[dar al-harb]] ("House of War"), and non-Muslim war captives were legitimate to enslave.<ref>Erdem, Y. Hakan. Slavery in the Ottoman Empire and its Demise, 1800–1909. London: Macmillan Press, 1996.</ref>
After capture, non-Muslim slaves were normally converted to Islam and given a new name. 

In the [[Ottoman Imperial Harem]] during the era of [[slavery in the Ottoman Empire]], for example, the new [[cariye]] slave girls and [[Concubinage in Islam|concubin]]es (sex slaves) were upon arrival customarily converted to Islam and given a new name, typically a Persian or Turkish name signifying the name of a flower or a bird, such as for example ''Nilüfer'' ('water lily').<ref>Peirce, L. P. (1993). The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignty in the Ottoman Empire. Storbritannien: Oxford University Press. p.35</ref> Since a person in Ottoman society was normally referred to by the name of their father after their personal name, female slaves, whose fathers were unknown and not Muslims, were given a paternal name associated with God, normally Abdallah: according to preserved records, 97 percent of female palace slaves at the Ottoman Imperial Harem were named ''bint'' ('daughter of') ''Abdallah''.<ref>Argit, B. İ. (2020). Life After the Harem: Female Palace Slaves, Patronage and the Imperial Ottoman Court. Storbritannien: Cambridge University Press. p.67</ref>

Example of this were [[Gülbahar Hatun (mother of Selim I)]]. The discovery of inscriptions (''vakfiye'') and others documents, where she was called ''Ayşe Gülbahar bint Abdüllah'', proves that she had Christian slave origins, since this is the traditional slave name by which slaves who converted to Islam were indicated.<ref name="gülbahar">{{cite book|author=Necdet Sakaoğlu|author-link=:tr:Necdet Sakaoğlu|title=Bu mülkün kadın sultanları: Vâlide sultanlar, hâtunlar, hasekiler, kadınefendiler, sultanefendiler|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6WUMAQAAMAAJ&q=%C3%82i%C5%9Fe+H%C3%A2tun+binti|publisher=Oğlak publications|year=2008|page=136|isbn=978-975-329-623-6}} (''Gülbahar binti Abdüssamed'' was the [[Ottoman Sultan]] [[Bayezid II]]'s eighth wife who had been sent to join his son [[Selim I]], the governor of [[Trebizond Eyalet]]).</ref><ref name=":1">{{cite web|url=http://www.enfal.de/otarih44.htm|title=Consorts Of Ottoman Sultans (in Turkish)|publisher = Ottoman Web Page}}</ref><ref name=":2">{{cite book|author=Anthony Dolphin Alderson|title=The Structure of the Ottoman Dynasty|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Wj64AAAAIAAJ&q=The+Structure+of+the+Ottoman+Dynasty|year=1956|publisher=Clarendon Press}}</ref><ref name="leslie">{{cite book|author=Leslie P. Peirce|title=The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignty in the Ottoman Empire|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=L6-VRgVzRcUC|year=1993|publisher=Oxford University Press|pages=106–107|isbn=978-0-19-508677-5}}</ref>

==United States==
{{further|African-American names}}
After they became free, [[African-American]] former slaves were free to choose their own names.<ref name="Craven">{{Cite web |last=Craven |first=Julia |date=2022-02-24 |title=Many African American last names hold weight of Black history |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/many-african-american-last-names-hold-weight-black-history-rcna17267 |access-date=19 September 2023 |website=NBC News |language=en}}</ref> Many chose names like "Freeman" to denote their new status, while others picked names of famous people or people they admired, such as [[List of presidents of the United States|US Presidents]] like [[George Washington]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.theroot.com/tracing-your-roots-were-slaves-surnames-like-brands-1796141007|title=Tracing Your Roots: Were Slaves' Surnames Like Brands?|website=The Root|date=16 June 2017 |access-date=19 September 2023}}</ref> Other commonly chosen names were "Johnson", "Brown" and "Williams", which had been popular before [[Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|emancipation]].

There is a common misconception in the [[United States]] that African Americans derive their last names from the owners of their [[Slavery in the United States|enslaved ancestors]].<ref name="Craven"/><ref>{{cite book|title=Economic Facts and Fallacies|author=Sowell, Thomas|page=163|year=2008|publisher=Basic Books}}</ref> For example, in his 1965 book, ''[[Message to the Blackman in America]]'', [[Elijah Muhammad]] wrote, "You must remember that slave-names will keep you a slave in the eyes of the civilized world today. You have seen, and recently, that Africa and Asia will not honor you or give you any respect as long as you are called by the white man's name."<ref>[http://www.seventhfam.com/temple/books/black_man/blk24.htm ''Message to the Blackman'']; [[Muhammad, Elijah]]; Chapter 24; seventhfam.com</ref>

Echoing this, [[Malcolm X]] said: 

{{quote|"The slave master who owned us put his last name on us to denote that we were his property. So when you see a negro today who's named Johnson, if you go back in his history you will find that his grandfather, or one of his forefathers, was owned by a white man who was named Johnson. My father didn't know his last name. My father got his last name from his grandfather, and his grandfather got it from his grandfather, who got it from the slave master. The real names of our people were destroyed during slavery."<ref>{{cite news |title=Hey, Black America, Let's All Ditch Our Slave Names |url=https://medium.com/bigger-picture/hey-black-america-lets-all-ditch-our-slave-names-2c899453b46 |access-date=June 2, 2022 |work=Medium}}</ref>|}}

As a result, some organizations, including Muhammad's [[Nation of Islam]] and the [[Black nationalism|black nationalist]] [[US Organization]] encourage African Americans to abandon their slave names.<ref>[http://www.us-organization.org/nguzosaba/NguzoSaba.html "NGUZO SABA (The Seven Principles)" From : US Organization website]</ref> In reality some ex-slaves did choose to take the name of their former owner, but generally that was not the case.<ref name="Craven"/>

Some African-Americans would later change their name after a religious conversion ([[Muhammad Ali]] changed his name from Cassius Clay, [[Malcolm X|el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz (Malcolm X)]] from Malcolm Little, [[Kareem Abdul-Jabbar]] from Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor Jr, and [[Louis Farrakhan]] changed his from Louis Eugene Walcott, for example)<ref>{{cite web|title=Louis Farrakhan Biography|url=http://www.biography.com/people/louis-farrakhan-9291850|work=Database|publisher=Biography.com|access-date=2011-10-20}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Muhammad Ali Biography|url=http://www.biography.com/people/muhammad-ali-9181165|work=Database|publisher=Biography.com|access-date=2011-10-20}}</ref>  or involvement with the [[black nationalist]] movement, in this latter case usually adopting names of African origin (e.g., [[Amiri Baraka]] and [[Assata Shakur]]).<ref>[[William L. Van Deburg|Deburg, William L. Van]], ''Modern Black Nationalism: From Marcus Garvey to Louis Farrakhan'',  NYU Press (1997), p. 269, {{ISBN|0-8147-8789-4}}</ref>

==Other references==
Irish singer [[Sinéad O'Connor]] stated in 2017 that she had changed her legal name to Magda Davitt, saying in an interview that she wished to be "free of the [[patriarchal]] slave names."<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/news/sinead-oconnor-dr-phil-interview-mother-emotional-sexual-abuse-suicide-attempts-a7942411.html|title=Sinead O'Connor's mother 'ran a torture chamber'|date=2017-09-12|website=The Independent|language=en|access-date=2019-10-25}}</ref> On her conversion to Islam in 2018, she adopted the [[Muslim name]] Shuhada' Sadaqat.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.thepointofeverything.com/2019/06/24/sinead-oconnor-shuhada-sadaqat-im-rebuilding-life/|title=Sinead O'Connor (Shuhada Sadaqat): 'I'm rebuilding life' {{!}} The Point Of Everything|language=en-US|access-date=2019-10-25}}</ref>

==See also==
* [[Nation of Islam]]

==References==
{{reflist|2}}

{{Personal names}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Slave Name}}
[[Category:Human names]]
[[Category:Slavery|Name]]
[[Category:Naming controversies]]