Hebraization of surnames
The Hebraization of surnames (also Hebraicization) (, Ivrut, "Hebraization") is the act of adopting a Hebrew surname. For many diaspora Jews who migrated to Israel, taking a Hebrew surname was a way to erase remnants of their diaspora experience and to assimilate into a new shared Jewish identity with Mizrahi Jews and Palestinian Jews (Jewish residents of Ottoman Syria and Mandatory Palestine) and later as Israeli Jews (Jewish citizens of the independent State of Israel). The phenomenon was especially common among Ashkenazi Jews, because many such families acquired permanent surnames (rather than patronyms) only when surnames were made compulsory by the November 12, 1787, decree by Habsburg Emperor Joseph II. Sephardi Jews from the Iberian peninsula often had hereditary family names since well before the expulsion from Spain (e.g., Cordovero, Abrabanel, Shaltiel, de Leon, Alcalai, Toledano, Lopez). Very few Hebrew surnames existed before Hebraization, such as Cohen (priest), Moss (Moses) and Levi (Levite). Several Hebrew surnames, such as Katz, Bogoraz, Ohl and Pak are in fact Hebrew acronyms even though they sound and are often perceived as being of non-Jewish origin (in these cases, from German, Russian, Polish and Korean, respectively). Hebraization began as early as the days of the