In the U.S. John Smith is used as sort of a default or placeholder name because John is a common first name and Smith is a common last name. What would you say your country’s version of that is?

32 comments

  1. *Svensson*. That’s just a common surname (but not currently the most common). I don’t think there’s a first name to go with it.

    Edit: For a while there was also *Svenne Banan* (usually as one word though), but it was more like a meme.

  2. In Romania is Ion (which also means John) with surnames like Popa (it means priest), Popescu ( which means son/offspring of the priest) or Ionescu (son of John). Other names would be Vasile (roughly Basil, i think in english?) and Gheorghe (George in english) and for women is Maria. We have an entire joke/comedy subgenre dedicated to Ion and Maria as the typical very dumb and uneducated redneck peasant couple from the romanian countryside.

  6. Janez Novak. It means John Newcomer in English.

    Novak is the most widely spread last name here. It is common for last names to either tell of your profession or place of origin. Novak basically means “new guy in town/village/”. Janez is sometimes used as an alternative to “a Slovenian”, and is a common name here, tho today it is more often shortened to Jan.

  8. We don’t have a set name for the “common male Dane”. Denmark have a sleuth of last names that change place as the most common, so the last name would be “Nielsen”, “Jensen”, or “Hansen”.

    It’s much the same for first names, with “Peter”, “Michael”, “Lars”, and “Jens” at the top, but the “Danish soldier” (like “Tommy” for the British soldier) is “Jens”, so let’s pick “Jens Nielsen” as the most stereotypical Danish name for men.

  9. In the U.K. (or at least England), it’s “Joe Bloggs”. And in the early 20th century it was “Tommy Atkins”

  10. In Poland it’s Jan Kowalski, it serves for a default name too but it is also pretty much direct translation for John Smith, „Jan” being „John” and „Kowalski” (the most popular polish surname) comes from the word „Kowal” – „Smith”.

  11. We have a similar ‘Jan Smid’ but since that is the name of a famous singer it is not used for that purpose. We do often talk about “Pietje en Jantje” as a placeholder.

  12. In Finland it’s Matti Meikäläinen. Matti is just a very common basic first name, and “meikäläinen” is a kind of funny way of saying “me”. Me-guy? This dude? Something like that. It’s also probably a real surname, it sounds like it could be. There’s also the fact that both the first and last name start with the same letter, and Finns really like alliteration in our language. The female equivalent is Maija Meikäläinen.

  16. In Norway it’s “Ola Nordmann” (for males) and “Kari Nordmann” (for women). “Ola” and “Kari” are common, a bit old-sounding first names, while “Nordmann” literally translates to “Norwegian”.

    They are also used to refer to “average Joes”, e.g. “I don’t think Ola Nordmann cares if his coffee is single-origin or not.”

  17. Jan Novák, Novák means something to the effect of “new person”, so someone who moved from elsewhere. It is the most common last name overall but not nearly as common in the eastern part of the country (where I live)

  18. The last name for that is probably “**Tamm**” (*oak*), though “Saar” (*island*) is also very common.

    The first name can vary depending on the target group (our first names are often very clearly of a certain generation), but I have seen “**Jaan Tamm**” around – Jaan is a super common first name, used in pretty much all generations and as it starts with a “J” it has this visual similarity to “John Smith” as well. According to statistics, names like Martin, Andres, Toomas, Margus, Jüri, Kristjan, Rein, Urmas and Aivar are more common (but I would not have thought that Rein or Aivar are, tbh).

    EDIT: It is actually maybe even more common to use a female name, “**Mari Maasikas**”. While “Mari” is a rather common first name, the surname is simply chosen because it starts with the same letter. “maasikas” means “strawberry” and it is not actually a common last name. And it’s a further pun, because “mari” means “berry”.

  19. In Slovenia it’s “Janez Novak”, at one point in time statistically most common name and surname. Even though it’s no longer the most common one, it has stuck as a template.

  20. In Bulgaria it would be Georgi Ivanov or Ivan Georgiev

    The most template bulgarian names imaginable

  21. In Greece, we have Giannis Papadopoulos.

    Giannis being John and Papadopoulos meaning son of the priest, both the most common names and surnames respectively

  22. I don’t think we have one, although *Zé Ninguém* might fight. *Zé* is short for *José* (Joseph), and *ninguém* means “nobody”, so it’s basically *Joe Nobody*. And *Maria* is often used for women, and some men say *my Maria* when referring to their partner. The generic first names are Joseph and Mary basically.

    Personally though, I find *João Martins* the most generic name among men my generation. I know lots of them. And I also know so many girls called *Catarina*.

    EDIT: I actually have a friend whose name is literally John Smith, but in Portuguese: *João Ferreiro*

  23. In Russia Ivan Kuznetsov (Smith in russian is the Kuznets) or Ivan Ivanov (most popular surname Ivanov)

  24. I’d say “Γιώργος Παπαδόπουλος”. They are the most common name and surname.

    Although as a programmer, i cant get “John Doe” out of my head.

  28. For Hungary I’d say Nagy István. Literal translation would be Great/Big Stephen. That’s an old people name though, Hungarian parents are drifting away from traditional names. For young people I’d say Ádám or Bence.

  31. *Jón bóndi* (“John the farmer”)

    *Jón Jónsson* (“John, son of John”)

    *[einhver] Jón úti í bæ* (“[some] John in the street”, some normal lad called John)

    *Jón og Gunna* (“John and [his wife] Gunna”)

    The term *Jón og séra Jón* (“John and *Sir* [the title of clergymen] John”) is used to contrast different social privileges.

  32. Jānis Bērziņš. Commonly used as a “default name”, Jānis is our version of John, Bērziņš – diminutive form of a birch tree. Pretty popular surnames also would be Kalniņš (diminutive hill) or Ozoliņš (diminutive oak tree).

Leave a Reply
You May Also Like