Pilat is a common surname in Central Europe. It is spelled simply Pilat in Western countries such as France and Austria, Pilát in Czech and Slovak, and Piłat in Polish. This may refer to individuals bearing the last name or the name itself.
The Southeast corner of Poland appears to be an ancestral heartland, with Lublin boasting a large number of the nearly 6,879 Poles sharing the surname. There are two different Piłatka localities in the Mazowsze and Lublin regions.
It is also the name of a natural park near Lyon in France.
"Bucket shops" purporting to sell Pilat 'family coats of arms' (a fallacy in terms) often draw spurious connections to those escutcheons (and histories) properly belonging to the counts Pielat, Pilati or of the Netherlands, Austria and France, respectively.