By Juan Alvarado

Spanish surnames (and place names) that come from Arabic surnames and origins.
Do you have Arab lineage?

This list originally began just for fun. The list soon took a life of its own. It became a bit of an obsession. As I learned more Arabic, I saw and heard the same words I grew up with in Spanish. Some people of Hispanic descent, who first learn about the history of Moorish Spain, look upon the bearer of this history with incredulity. Apart from showing pictures, what more proof could you give? This is my language — a language very much influenced by the Moors.

Toponyms are place names. Many have evolved to become surnames. The ones listed here are mostly found in the Iberian peninsula of Arabic origin.

There are literally hundreds if not thousands of toponyms of Arabic origin in Iberia. These include cities, towns, villages, provinces and regions. They even include neighborhoods (barrios) and streets. They may also include geographical features such as mountains, valleys, rivers, lakes. Arabic place names are common in all of the Iberian peninsula (Spain and Portugal) including much of the North of the country (with the exception of those regions that never came under Moorish rule or where it was for the most part short-lived. Among those regions that didn’t come under Moorish rule are Galicia, Asturias, Catalonia, and the Basque country. Most of the places where Arabic toponyms are most common are the eastern coast and the region of Andalusia (Andalucía). Within Portugal, the frequency of Arabic place names proliferate as one travels south in the country.

Those areas that retained their pre-Islamic names during the Moorish period were generally Arabized. The pronunciation of the names were markedly changed and remain noticeable in their modern names: e.g. Caesarea Augusta became (سرقسطة) Saraqustah and then Zaragoza in Spanish.