The O' was apparently not used in Scotland. In Icelandic the surname is patronymic, and it changes from generation to generation. French de, when written separately, like German von, is deemed to mark a noble name. Although in most European cultures the surname follows the given name, Hungarian names tend to reverse this order, as do names in Chinese, Japanese, and other languages. In Russian the middle name consists of the father's forename with a patronymic suffix, e.g., Nikolayevich.
Amharic names are concatenations of the child's given name and the father's given name.
Native American names often referred to elements in nature or attributed special traits to the person. In the Western world a woman traditionally adopted the family name of her husband at the time of her marriage. In many cultures the name is of supernatural significance. Besides animistic commonplaces such as naming a child after a lucky person or a wily animal, there are widespread taboo practices, such as not naming a child after a living relative or changing the name on the death of a namesake or avoiding the name of a family totem. In some cultures the name given the child at birth is temporary and is replaced with another at puberty, or whenever the individual attains a new age grade .