How far have we got in the work of compiling ‘The Atlas of Con-temporary Hungarian Surnames’?

Abstract

How far have we got in the work of compiling ‘The Atlas of Contemporary Hungarian Surnames’?  

The first part of the paper reports on the present state of the work of compiling ‘The Atlas of Contemporary Hungarian Surnames’. The author speaks about the development of the search engine and the geographic information system needed to generate the maps for the Atlas, as well as about the elaboration of the necessary mathematical support programs. The author also discusses the theoretical and methodological approaches adopted in the compilation of frequency lists and in the definition of lexical types. The second part of the paper, based on thematic maps on the surname Orsós, gives us an insight into the process of how one can make some valid statements about the relationship between the observed surname and the Hungarian Beas Gypsies, when showing on maps the geographical distribution of the relevant data stored in MMCsA / DHS (A mai magyar családnevek adatbázisa / The Database of Hungarian Surnames), including more than 10 million surnames.