No surname?

[abacucat]

I worked with someone who insisted she had no surname. So her name was something like Mary...and that was it. The computer systems were set up for surnames, so she was entered in them as Mary Mary.

Anyone else come across this?

Yes, in Indonesia.

Was she quite contrary?

You don't legally have to have one.

Georgie Quiet, but quite alternative and sure in her views.

Is she a Freeman of The Land? (Look it up) we had a parent once that was a knob FoTL and he was a hoot.

Depends where she is from. Many countries don't have names as in first name, surname.
I have 2 friends who although legally only have one name, when they came to England became that name twice, so Samad Samad, and Jama Jama.
She could be just being very alternative though!

She is white, no idea where she was born, but is quite alternative.

She may have decided to drop the surname because she doesn't want to be associated with the family it came from.

wouldn't you have to have a surname for passport and official records?

@mygrandchildrenrock

People with just one name, do they have just one name on their passport?

That’s brilliant, Georgie!

I worked with a man from Australia I think who was abandoned as a child and became a ward if the state. By all accounts those days the state didn't provide a surname because it implied family or something similar so his name was just "Trevor" obviously not his name

When he was older the Aus government had changed the rules and offered him the option of choosing a surname but he chose to forgo it as a symbol of his history.

It played havoc with our systems but they found a way around it.

Went over the OP’s head though!

KennDodd Yes when they travelled on their home country passport but when they became British Citizens they had 2 names on their passport, the same two names!

Georgie

Yes, white British and only answers to "Billy". No surname. Total attention seeking knob.
Did I mention "Billy" is female by the way?

Duh! Yes I missed it.

Surnames are all a bit bunk. As people have noted, parts of Indonesia have no use for them at all. In China, the family name precedes the given name.
Western surnames come from one of 2 routes (mostly). The Norse/Saxons only used first names for the most part, but when there are 10 Ragnars, you need to differentiate, so you added 'son' or 'dottir' to the father's given name or nickname. So the famous Ivar Lothbrokson was Ivar son of the Lothbrok (a nick name for Ragnar Lothbrok whose father's name is now lost). Ivar's son was Sigtrygg Ivarson. A girl could have been Thyra Ivarsdottir.
The other strand of surname is profession or place of birth. Coopers, Smiths, Archers, etc.
The Romans used fixed family names to work out inheritance disputes and similar. Interestingly, they did this by prestige, so a man marrying into a more prestigious family would change his name. Later, Christianity would use the forced renaming of women as part of it's suppression of females (look up Saint Hilda for more)

You can have passports with only one name, I've seen it done. Some Indian nationals only have one name.