Learn why Croatian nouns end in -ic

Eduardo Marini
SÃO PAULO, SP (FOLHAPRESS) – Lists of countries such as Croatia and Serbia, which were part of the former Yugoslavia, are full of surnames with the “ic” suffix. This is the case of Modric, Perisic, Milinkovic-Savic, Tadic, Kovacic, and most of the players in South Slavic teams – from the Balkans, a region in eastern Europe.

In the Serbo-Croatian language, the suffix means “son”. Thus, Modrić means “son of Modar”. This does not mean that his father was called that, but in his family one of his ancestors was known to be the son of Mudar.

These surnames, known as patronymics, which are defined by the name of one of the family’s ancestors, exist in several languages, including Portuguese.

Such is the case of “Fernandez” which means “son of Fernando”. The same thing happens in English: the captain of the English team is named Jordan Henderson. The suffix “son” gives the surname the meaning of “son of Henry.”

Still in the UK another form of paternalism is known by the prefix “Mc”, as in the case of Scottish midfielder James MacArthur. And it doesn’t stop there: The “O” prefix is also a patronymic, as in “O’Connor.”

In Poland, surnames like this end in “iak”, as in the case of midfielder Grzegorz Krychowiak, in “ski”, as in Lewandowski, or in “wicz”, as in the case of defender Sebastian Walukiewicz.

Photo: Ascom / Viva

Thus, most Croatian players carry their ancestor’s name in their surname. See the list of players on the chess team whose last names end in “ic”:

Dominik Levakovic (Dinamo Zagreb)
Ivica Ivosic (Osijek)
Ivo Grbic (Atletico Madrid)
Borna Parisik (Rangers)
Josip Juranović (Celtic)
Josip Stanisic (Bayern Munich)
Martin Erlich (Sassuolo)
Mateo Kovacic (Chelsea)
Luka Modric (Real Madrid)
Mario Pasalik (Atalanta)
Marcelo Brozovic (Inter Milan)
Nikola Vlasic (Torino)
Christian Jakic (Eintracht Frankfurt)
Luka Susic (RB Salzburg)
Ivan Perisic (Tottenham)
Andrej Kramarek (Hoffenheim)
Mislav Orsic (Dinamo Zagreb)
Bruno Petkovic (Dinamo Zagreb).