Wednesday, November 17, 2010
The Surname: Goldfoot
The Austrian decree of 1787 stipulated the use of family names by Jews, specifically limiting the choice of given names to biblical names. This law was abolished in Bohemia on August 11, 1836. Also, the Prussian government attempted to limit the choice of Jewish family names. The law was subsequently revoked. So we may have received our surname in 1787. Jews had to buy their names.
American Surnames: "Favorites with the Jews are the "Gold" names. An occupation of medieval Jews was the lending of money at interest and this being combined with other work of the goldsmith made the German goldschmidt. Some are combined with place names as Goldberg. Other Gold names were formed by linking another word to Gold, chiefly German names as Goldfinger. " So, our surname of Goldfoot must have been picked in Germany/Austria. It evidently came from Germany/Austria as there are Goldfoots who are not Jewish and of a different haplogroup of dna, so they are not related to us. The Jewish migration did go to Germany and then on north to Eastern Europe, so we were in that group.
Only a handful of Jews were permitted to live in Russia before the Russian Revolution. Until then, we were all in Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova and the Baltics. But you probably know this. from Barry Zwick, in DNA.
The 1905 Russian Revolution was a wave of mass political and social unrest that spread through vast areas of the Russian Empire. Some of it was directed against the government, while some was undirected. It included terrorism, worker strikes, peasant unrest, and military mutinies. My grandfather, Nathan, had come to the States just before this event. I believe he lived in Telsiai, Lithuania before he emigrated even though he had said, "Russia" on the 1910 census for his home. This had become a part of the Pale of Settlement of Russia where Jews were confined.
American Surnames: "Favorites with the Jews are the "Gold" names. An occupation of medieval Jews was the lending of money at interest and this being combined with other work of the goldsmith made the German goldschmidt. Some are combined with place names as Goldberg. Other Gold names were formed by linking another word to Gold, chiefly German names as Goldfinger. " So, our surname of Goldfoot must have been picked in Germany/Austria. It evidently came from Germany/Austria as there are Goldfoots who are not Jewish and of a different haplogroup of dna, so they are not related to us. The Jewish migration did go to Germany and then on north to Eastern Europe, so we were in that group.
Only a handful of Jews were permitted to live in Russia before the Russian Revolution. Until then, we were all in Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova and the Baltics. But you probably know this. from Barry Zwick, in DNA.
The 1905 Russian Revolution was a wave of mass political and social unrest that spread through vast areas of the Russian Empire. Some of it was directed against the government, while some was undirected. It included terrorism, worker strikes, peasant unrest, and military mutinies. My grandfather, Nathan, had come to the States just before this event. I believe he lived in Telsiai, Lithuania before he emigrated even though he had said, "Russia" on the 1910 census for his home. This had become a part of the Pale of Settlement of Russia where Jews were confined.
Labels: Goldfoot, Names in Austria
