Surname

When did people start using surname? Surnames became obligatory in The Netherlands during the time of Louis Napoleon. He was appointed by his brother Napoleon Bonaparte in 1806. As their way of protest, many Dutch chose a strange, meaningless (or rather: words with funny meaning) surname.

Some common surnames: de Boer (means: farmer, some surnames were derived from occupation), van ... (from ... followed by a city name, i.e. : van Deventer), there are also surnames derived from adjectives, i.e.: De Groot (the Big).

But many are not that willing to choose a proper surname, hence nowadays we can find a television reporter named 'de Hond' (means: the Dog). Remember the football player Koeman? FYI, koe = cow. Somewhere I read there's someone whose surname is Koe-Melkman (melkman = milkman).

So, how important is surname? VERY! Not only because in every form there are separate fields for surname and given name(s), surnames are very important that my bank only have my surname and initials. No where in the paper they even asked what my first name is.

Something tickled me: how long have batakese been using surnames? Anybody knows? I have some kind of estimation, does anyone know for sure?