onomastics

First attested in 1936, from the adjective onomastic (“of or belonging to naming”) (1716) with a suffix -s, from French onomastique, from Ancient Greek ὀνομαστικός (onomastikós), from ὀνομαστός (onomastós, “named”), form of ὀνομάζω (onomázō, “I name”), from ὄνομα (ónoma, “name”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁nómn̥ (“name”) (whence English name).^[1]

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˌɒ.nəʊˈmæs.tɪks/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˌɑː.noʊˈmæs.tɪks/, /ˌɑː.nəˈmæs.tɪks/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

onomastics pl (plural only)

1. The branch of lexicology devoted to the study of names and naming, especially the origins of names.

   Synonym: onomatology

   Hypernyms: lexicology, (in sense of “origins”) etymology

   Hyponyms: anthroponymy, toponymy

   • 2024, Susie Dent, Guilty By Definition, Zaffre, page 65:

     Her father had long been a student of onomastics, and loved to unpack the names of people they encountered as children.

   • (Can we date this quote?), David Vaculík, “Parts of the city of Ostrava – The past and current state of urbanonymy”, in Masaryk University Brno‎^[1], page 405:

     From the point of view of onomastics, proper names fulfill many functions (individualizing, localizing, differentiating etc.).