Icelandic name
Icelandic surnames are different from most other naming systems in the modern Western world in that they are patronymic or occasionally matronymic: they indicate the father (or mother) of the child and not the historic family lineage.
Iceland shares a common cultural heritage with the Scandinavian countries of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden.
Unlike these countries, Icelanders have continued to use their traditional name system, which was formerly used in most of Northern Europe.
Notable Icelanders with inherited family names include former prime minister Geir Haarde, football star Eiður Smári Guðjohnsen, entrepreneur Magnús Scheving, film director Baltasar Kormákur Samper, and actress Anita Briem.
With some exceptions, it must contain only letters found in the Icelandic alphabet (including þ and ð), and it must be possible to decline the name according to the language's grammatical case system, which in practice means that a genitive form can be constructed in accordance with Icelandic rules.
Moreover, Icelanders who are officially registered as nonbinary are permitted to use the patro- and matronymic suffix -bur ("child of") instead of -son or -dóttir.
This practice has become less common (the use of middle names having replaced it), but features conspicuously in the Icelandic sagas.
Some well-known Icelanders with matronymic names are the football player Heiðar Helguson ("Helga's son"), the novelist Guðrún Eva Mínervudóttir ("Minerva's daughter"), and the medieval poet Eilífr Goðrúnarson ("Goðrún's son").
In the Icelandic film Bjarnfreðarson the title character's name is the subject of some mockery for his having a matronymic – as Bjarnfreður's son – rather than a patronymic.
[9] Some people have both a matronymic and a patronymic, such as Dagur Bergþóruson Eggertsson ("the son of Bergþóra and Eggert"), the mayor of Reykjavík since 2014.
Icelandic singer-songwriter Björk had a daughter in 2002 with American contemporary artist and filmmaker Matthew Barney.
[13] In Russia, where name-patronyms of similar style were historically used (such as Ivan Petrovich which means Ivan, the son of Peter), the much larger population necessitated family names, relegating the patronymic to a middle name and conversational honorific.
The Icelandic naming system occasionally causes problems for families travelling abroad, especially with young children, since non-Icelandic immigration staff (apart from those of other Nordic countries) are usually unfamiliar with the practice and therefore expect children to have the same last names as that of their parents.
[citation needed] Television presenter Magnus Magnusson acquired his name when his parents adopted British naming conventions while living in the United Kingdom, taking Magnus's father's patronymic as a surname.
