A slave name is a term for a name given to a person who is or has been enslaved or a name inherited from enslaved ancestors. Modern use of the term applies mostly to African-Americans and West Indians who are descended from slaves, and can be used in a derogatory manner.
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In Roman slavery, slaves often had a single name, given at the discretion of their owner.
A slave who was manumitted might keep his or her slave name and adopt his or her former owner's name as a praenomen and nomen. As an example, one historian describes "a man named Publius Larcius [who] freed a male slave named Nicia, who was then called Publius Larcius Nicia."[1]
Historian Harold Whetstone Johnston writes of instances in which a slave's former owner chose to ignore custom and gave the freedman a name of the owner's choosing.[2]
According to Johnston, descendants of Roman freedmen frequently changed their "slave names" to conceal their ancestor's enslavement.[citation needed]
In the Dutch colony in present day Cape Town, slaves were named after the months they were purchased on. This resulted in surnames such as Januarie and Februarie.
Prior to the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, the vast majority of African-Americans in the United States were enslaved. During enslavement, slaves' names were assigned by their owners. Others received a name based on what kind of work they were forced to do. Some African-Americans have last names such as Cotton, reflecting when they were made to pick cotton as slaves.[citation needed]
After emancipation, many freedmen and -women took the surnames of their former owners as their own. Some blacks in the U.S. took on the surname Freeman, while others adopted the names of popular historical or contemporary figures of social importance, such as former presidents Washington, Jefferson, and Jackson.
A number of African-Americans and Jamaican Americans have changed their names out of the belief that the names they were given at birth were "slave names." An individual's name change often coincides with a religious conversion (Muhammad Ali and Louis Farrakhan, for example) or involvement with the black nationalist movement (e.g., Amiri Baraka and Assata Shakur).[citation needed]
Some organizations encourage African-Americans to abandon their "slave names." The Nation of Islam is perhaps the best-known of them. In his book, Message to the Blackman in America, Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad writes often of "slave names." Some of his comments include:
Other organizations, such as the Black Nationalist US Organization, also advocate for African-Americans to change their "slave names."[citation needed]