Spanish names are the traditional way of identifying, and the official way of registering a person in Spain. They are composed of a given name (simple or composite) and two surnames (the first surname of each parent). Traditionally, the first surname is the father's first surname, and the second is the mother's first surname. Since 1999, the order of the surnames of the children in a family in Spain is decided when registering the first child, but the traditional order is nearly universally chosen (99.53% of the time). Women generally do not change their name with marriage.
The practice is to use one given name and the first surname generally (e.g. "Penélope Cruz" for Penélope Cruz Sánchez); the complete name is reserved for legal, formal and documentary matters. Both surnames are sometimes systematically used when the first surname is very common (e.g., Federico García Lorca, Pablo Ruiz Picasso or José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero) to get a more distinguishable name. In these cases, it is even common to use only the second surname, as in "Lorca", "Picasso" or "Zapatero". This does not affect alphabetization: "Federico García Lorca", the Spanish poet, should be alphabetized in an index under "García Lorca", not "Lorca".
Spanish naming customs were extended to countries under Spanish rule, influencing naming customs of Hispanic America and the Philippines to different extents.
Basic structure Currently in Spain, people bear a single or composite given name ( in Spanish) and two surnames ( in Spanish).
A composite given name is composed of two (or more) single names; for example, Juan Pablo is considered not to be a first and a second forename, but a single composite forename.
The two surnames refer to each of the parental families. Traditionally, a person's first surname is the father's first surname (), while their second surname is the mother's first surname (). For example, if a man named Eduardo Fernández Garrido marries a woman named María Dolores Martínez Ruiz (note that women do not change their name with marriage) and they have a child named José, there are several legal options, but their child would most usually be known as José Fernández Martínez.
Spanish gender equality law has allowed surname transposition since 1999, subject to the condition that every sibling must bear the same surname order recorded in the (civil registry), but there have been legal exceptions. Since 2013, if the parents of a child were unable to agree on the order of surnames, an official would decide which is to come first, with the paternal name being the default option. The only requirement is that every son and daughter must have the same order of the surnames, so they cannot change it separately. Since June 2017, adopting the paternal name first is no longer the standard method, and parents are required to sign an agreement wherein the name order is expressed explicitly. The law also grants a person the option, upon reaching adulthood, of reversing the order of their surnames. However, this legislation only applies to Spanish citizens; people of other nationalities are issued the surname indicated by the laws of their original country.
Each of these two surnames can also be composite in itself, with the parts usually linked by: the conjunction y or e (and), the preposition de (of), or a hyphen. For example, a person's name might be Juan Pablo Fernández de Calderón García-Iglesias, consisting of a forename (Juan Pablo), a paternal surname (Fernández de Calderón), and a maternal surname (García-Iglesias).
Forms of address
A man named José Antonio Gómez Iglesias would normally be addressed as either señor Gómez or señor Gómez Iglesias instead of señor Iglesias, because Gómez is his first surname. Furthermore, Mr. Gómez might be informally addressed as José Antonio José Pepe (nickname for José) Antonio Toño (nickname for Antonio) Joselito, Josito, Joselillo, Josico or Joselín (diminutives of José) Antoñito, Toñín, Toñito, Ñoño or Nono (diminutives of Antonio) Joseán (apocopation). Very formally, he could be addressed with an honorific such as don José Antonio or don José.
It is not unusual, when the first surname is very common, like García in the example above, for a person to be referred to formally using both family names, or casually by their second surname only. For example, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (elected President of the Spanish Government in the 2004 and 2008 general elections) is often called simply Zapatero, the name he inherited from his mother's family since Rodríguez is a common surname and may be ambiguous. The same occurs with another former Spanish Socialist leader, Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, with the poet and dramatist Federico García Lorca, and with the painter Pablo Ruiz Picasso. As these people's paternal surnames are very common, they are often referred to by their maternal surnames (Rubalcaba, Lorca, Picasso). It would nonetheless be a mistake to index Rodríguez Zapatero under Z or García Lorca under L. (Picasso, who spent most of his adult life in France, is normally indexed under "P".)
In an English-speaking environment, Spanish-named people sometimes hyphenate their surnames to avoid having their first surname perceived as a middle name, and their second surname perceived as their only surname.
In Spanish-speaking countries, hyphenated surnames arise when someone wants both the paternal and maternal surnames passed to future generations, and the next generation receives the two, hyphenated, as a single (paternal) surname. Occasionally the two are fused into a simple (unhyphenated) name, such as Jovellanos (from Jove and Llanos). Rarely, the two names are left unhyphenated, such as López Portillo, which may lead to confusion.
Forenames Parents choose their child's given name, which must be recorded in the (Civil Registry) to establish their legal identity. With few restrictions, parents can now choose any name; common sources of names are the parents' taste, honouring a relative, the General Roman Calendar nomina (nominal register), and traditional Spanish names. Legislation in Spain under Franco's dictatorship legally limited cultural naming customs to only Christian (Jesus, Mary, saints) and typical Spanish names (Álvaro, Jimena, etc.). Although the first part of a composite forename generally reflects the sex of the child, the second personal name need not (e.g. José María Aznar). At present, the only naming limitation is the dignity of the child, who cannot be given an insulting name. Similar limitations applied against diminutive, familiar, and colloquial variants not recognized as names proper, and "those that lead to confusion regarding sex"; however, current law allows registration of diminutive names.El Periódico, Una familia puede por fin inscribir a su hijo como Pepe tras dos años de papeleo, 17 April 2007.
María, José and Jesús in composite given names
Girls are often named María, honouring the Virgin Mary, by appending either a shrine, place, or religious-concept suffix-name to María. In daily life, such women omit the "Mary of the ..." nominal prefix, and use the suffix portion of their composite names as their public, rather than legal, identity. Hence, women with Marian names such as María de los Ángeles (María of the Angels), María del Pilar (María of the Pillar), and María de la Luz (María of the Light), are normally addressed as Ángeles (Angels), Pilar (Pillar), and Luz (Light); however, each might be addressed as María. Nicknames such as Maricarmen for María del Carmen, Marisol for "María (de la) Soledad" ("Our Lady of Solitude", the Virgin Mary), Dolores or Lola for María de los Dolores ("Our Lady of Sorrows"), Mercedes or Merche for María de las Mercedes ("Our Lady of Mercy"), etc. are often used. Also, parents can simply name a girl María, or Mari without a suffix portion.
It is common for a boy's formal name to include María, preceded by a masculine name, e.g. José María Aznar, Juan María Vicencio de Ripperdá or Antonio María Rouco Varela. Equivalently, a girl can be formally named María José, e.g. skier María José Rienda, and informally named Marijose, Mariajo, Majo, Ajo, Marisé or even José in honour of St. Joseph. María as a masculine name is often abbreviated in writing as M. (José M. Aznar), Ma. (José Ma. Aznar), or M.ª (José M.ª Morelos). It is unusual for any names other than the religiously significant María and José to be used in this way except for the name Jesús that is also very common and can be used as Jesús or Jesús María for a boy and María Jesús for a girl, and can be abbreviated as Sus, Chus and other nicknames.
Registered names
The (Civil Registry) officially records a child's identity as composed of a forename (simple or composite) and the two surnames; however, a child can be religiously baptized with several forenames, e.g. Felipe Juan Froilán de Todos los Santos. Until the 1960s, it was customary to baptize children with three forenames: the first was the main and the only one used by the child; if parents agreed, one of the other two was the name of the day's saint. Nowadays, baptizing with three or more forenames is usually a royal and noble family practice.
Marriage
In Spain married people keep their original surnames (unlike in some near cultures in which they may adopt the spouse's family name as a married name). In some instances, such as high society meetings, the partner's surname can be added after the person's surnames using the preposition de (of). An example would be a Leocadia Blanco Álvarez, married to a Pedro Pérez Montilla, may be addressed as Leocadia Blanco de Pérez or as Leocadia Blanco Álvarez de Pérez. This format is not used in everyday settings and has no legal value.
Similarly, a widow may be identified using "viuda de" ("widow of" in Spanish) or its abbreviation "vda." for, as in Leocadia Blanco vda. de Pérez.
Generational transmission
In the generational transmission of surnames, the paternal surname's precedence eventually eliminates the maternal surnames from the family lineage. Contemporary law (1999) allows the maternal surname to be given precedence, but most people observe the traditional paternal–maternal surname order. Therefore, the daughter and son of Ángela López Sáenz and Tomás Portillo Blanco are usually called Laura Portillo López and Pedro Portillo López but could also be called Laura López Portillo and Pedro López Portillo. The two surnames of all siblings must be in the same order when recorded in the . Spanish naming customs include the orthographic option of conjoining the surnames with the conjunction particle y, or e before a name starting with 'I', 'Hi' or 'Y', (both meaning "and") (e.g., José Ortega y Gasset, Tomás Portillo y Blanco, or Eduardo Dato e Iradier), following an antiquated aristocratic usage.
Patrilineal surname transmission was not always the norm in Spanish-speaking societies. Prior to the mid-eighteenth century, when the current paternal-maternal surname combination norm was adopted, Hispanophone societies often practised matrilineal surname transmission, giving children the maternal surname and occasionally giving children a grandparent's surname (borne by neither parent) for prestige – being perceived as gentry – and profit, flattering the matriarch or the patriarch in hope of inheriting land. A more recent example can be found in the name of Francisco de Asís Franco y Martínez-Bordiú (born 1954), who took first the name of his mother, Carmen Franco, rather than that of his father, Cristóbal Martínez-Bordiú, 10th Marquis of Villaverde, in order to perpetuate the family name of his maternal grandfather, the Caudillo Francisco Franco.