"The Anglo-French word for ’son’; chiefly Hist. in patronymic designations, in which it was followed by the name of a parent in the uninflected genitive. Some of these survive as surnames, e.g. Fitzherbert, Fitzwilliam, etc.; in later times new surnames of the kind have been given to the illegitimate children of royal princes. Also in 12-15th c. used occas. in adopted AF. phrases, beau fitz = ‘fair son’; fiz a putain = ‘whoreson’."

And from literature:

"From this premise one might expect a swashbuckling adventure, with the bastard, called simply Fitz, leaving a trail of bodies in his wake."

And from geneologists:

When the Normans conquered England in 1066, they eventually migrated to Ireland. Hence, the prefix "Fitz" is a corruption of the French word "fils", meaning son. In time, "Fitz" came to mean "bastard son", as the Normans were regarded with great disdain by the local Gaels. A noteworthy "Fitz" name of true Norman origin is "Fitzroy" which derives from the French "fils de roi", meaning bastard son of the king. As the "Fitz" names were translated into Gaelic, they maintained their somewhat scornful connotation...

Okay... enough with defiling Dana's good (last) name. Here's someone that thinks the experts are wrong:

"Some people seem think that the name element "fitz" was a mark of bastards. It wasn't. It was just a standard Norman way to say "son of", like Latin "filius", Welsh "ap", Scottish "mac", et cetera. Identifying people by their father's given name was a common practice in the earlier Middle Ages. Inherited surnames came in at various times in various places. (I don't think Iceland has them to this day.)"

The experts on Wiki agree to some extent, but the closing sentence is damning:

"The Hiberno-Norman patronymic prefix Fitz-, used in many Irish names of late medieval origin, signifying "son." Like the Scottish Mac, the Irish O', and the Oriental Ben, it is prefixed to proper names to signify descent, as in the Norman names Fitzwilliam, Fitzwalter, Fitzgerald. More recently, new surnames based on this prefix were created for illegitimate children of royal princes (Fitzroy, Fitzjames, and Fitzclarence)."

So - Fitz doesn't necessarily mean "bastard." It only means that if either:

1. the actual name was created after the Gaels started hating the Normans, or
2. you are Gaelic and don't like Normans yourself, or
3. you aren't Gaelic, but you still don't think the Normans are worth a damn.

That's about it.

Due to xenophobia, racism, classism, or just plain hatred, the Gaels didn't like the Normans. Fitz, being a common last name amongst the Normans, was a used as a way of insulting the whole group. Imagine if people didn't like people named Tate and decided to name all the kids born with three arms with the name just to demean me. In this way I would lose control of my own name as more and more three armed kids were given my name. Pretty soon people would begin looking for my third arm as soon as they heard my name. This method of last names being shortened and repurposed as insults has been carried out in every era we know of. Just looking through this list you'll find dozens of last names that have been used as weapons against their owners.

I think that the use of Fitz to connote bastardism has come and gone. I point to the afforementioned list as evidence... Fitz isn't on it.

Did Fitz at one point mean something pretty darn bad? Yep. And people of that era knew it. The problem is that the time has passed. Today only scholars can tell which names were original Norman and which were the ones created demeaningly by the Gaels (or perhaps helpfully - if you believe that they used the name to aid geneologists.) Either way, so few people know the offensive meaning that it has essentially lost its purpose. (I think that only fans of medieval fiction, history buffs, and geneologists know the link... though those fiction writers seem to be working overtime to keep the link strong.)

I know as soon as I post this I'll think of a more recent example that could've made this a stronger argument...

People with the name Fitz____ make their own way in the world. The Fitz____ name (or dare I say "brand") has been strong for ages, and trying to associate a racist view with it today is just wrong - even if there is historical precedent. (But for me the strongest argment that Fitz doesn't mean something bad is the first paragraph of this post.)

How does this relate to branding? Think about how McDonalds works to control the prefix of their name. Any time a business opens up as McAnything they make an issue of it. What they can't control, however, is the way the public uses the name. Remember McPaper? (Either a slang term for USA Today or a quickly written school assignment.) Human nature causes us to try to find aspects that are familiar about new things so we can categorize them - so if we find a company that exemplifies a particular aspect (e.g., fast production times) we may mentally attatch a portion of the company to other similar companies, people, or objects in the world. We use the name (or part of the name) as a descriptor. Look at how we use Cadillac, Yugo, and Pinto, as stand-ins for luxurious, poorly made, and firetrap.

Try applying this to your own business. If people were to use your company name as a stand-in for something, what would it be? Is it a synonym for "well made" or "rude service"? When you figure it out you can let us know... until then we'll be reading our McPaper

Tate Linden Principal Consultant Stokefire Consulting Group 703-778-9925