Oeconym

An oeconym or oikonym (from Greek: οἶκος, oikos, 'house, dwelling' and ὄνομα, onoma, 'name') is a traditional proper name of a house or other building. In the broad sense, the term may refer to the name of any inhabited place.

Sometimes the term ecodomonym is used to refer specifically to a building as an inhabited place. Compare also the term mansionym to designate a historical residence (e.g., the Daniel Boone Homestead). Lay terms referring to the proper name of a house or other building include house name (either traditional or modern),farm name (referring to an entire farm), or property name (referring to a non-agricultural property).

Individuals may traditionally be referred to by their oeconyms rather than their surnames in Basque, Finnish, Norwegian, Slovene, and other languages. In these cultures the name of the property is more or less fixed and may be used to refer to the people living there at any particular time, regardless of their actual surname or whether they recently purchased or moved to the property.

German oeconyms (German: Hofname) were often adopted as surnames. Surnames with such origins are most common in Lower Saxony and North Rhine-Westphalia.

Explicit reference is made to oeconyms (and their lack of correspondence with residents' names) in Njáls saga, a 13th-century Icelandic work describing events between 960 and 1020. For example:

Þar eru þrír bæir er í Mörk heita allir. Á miðbænum bjó sá maður er Björn hét og var kallaður Björn hvíti.
'There are three farms in that district, all called Mörk. At the middle farm lived a man named Björn [Kaðalsson], known as Björn the White.' (chapter 148)

In comparison to oeconyms in Norwegian and Faroese, in which the share of such names based on persons' names may be as low as 4 to 5%, in Icelandic approximately 32% of oeconyms are based on a personal name. Since 1953, oeconyms have been enshrined in law, and Icelandic farms are required to have registered names approved by a special committee. As travel by ship became more common in Iceland, the number of farms that had to be distinguished grew in number, and more complex compound names were created. In compound Icelandic oeconyms, the single most common second element is -staðir 'place', although topographical suffixes (-dalr 'valley', -nes 'headland', -fell 'hill', -eyrr 'bank') form the largest group of such elements.

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