Slavic surnames in the books of J. K. Rowling, part 3

In addition to the two characters already discussed, a large portion of the Slavs mentioned in the *Harry Potter* series are Quidditch players from Slavic countries. The most famous among them is, of course, Viktor Krum. However, since the same naming mistake Rowling made with his surname is repeated with several other members of the Bulgarian national team, it makes sense to examine them all together.

Bulgarian readers must feel a strange mix of amusement and mild irritation when they read Goblet of Fire. It seems as if Rowling, when choosing surnames for the Bulgarian Quidditch team, simply consulted a “List of Famous Bulgarians” or something similar.

For example, the Chaser Alexei Levski (and later his son) was clearly named after Bulgaria’s national hero, the revolutionary Vassil Levski. The irony is that Levski was actually a pseudonym — his real surname was Kunchev. The same mistake appears with the Keeper, Lev Zograf. The famous 19th-century Bulgarian icon painters were the brothers Dimitar and Zahari Zograf, but Zograf was merely their shared nickname, literally meaning icon painter. Their actual surname was Dimitarov.

Viktor Krum’s surname also appears to come from a major Bulgarian historical figure — the medieval Bulgarian Khan Krum the Fearsome. But here it should be noted that Krum, while rare, is still a normal given name among Bulgarians and especially Macedonians, so a surname derived from it is not unusual. The real issue is that Rowling didn’t understand how Bulgarian surnames are formed. As a result, Krum sounds like a middle name or a nickname rather than a proper surname. The correct form would be Krumov — a real surname borne, for instance, by the Bulgarian Greco-Roman wrestler and world champion Petar Krumov.

Rowling never quite fixed this problem. Fifteen years after Goblet of Fire, when she wrote about the 2014 Quidditch World Cup for Pottermore, the Bulgarian team still included names like Georgi Zdravko (should be Zdravkov) and Stoyanka Grozda (should be Grozdina). There was even a female player given the distinctly male name Nikola instead of the proper feminine forms Nikol or Nikolina — Nikola Vasileva.

At least Nikola’s surname is correct: Vassileva, not the Russian-style Vasilyeva. The other Bulgarian Quidditch players, who bear simple, very common patronymic surnames (Vulchanov, Dimitrov, Draganov, Ivanova), often suffer from imperfect romanization. Their first names are rendered as if they were Russian rather than Bulgarian: Vasily Dimitrov instead of Vassil Dimitarov, Pyotr Vulchanov instead of Petar Valchanov, Ivan Volkov instead of Ivan Valkov.

A woman having a man’s first name is one thing, but it’s even worse when a character is given a surname as a first name. That fate befell the Russian Quidditch player Petrova Porskoff. Petrova is clearly a female surname in Russian, not a first name. The Russian publisher ROSMEN tried to fix it by turning her into a man named Pyotr Porskov in their translation. In the fandom, some have interpreted Porskoff as a mangled version of the Russian female name Praskov'.

Rowling handles Polish names and surnames noticeably better. The Polish players Josef Wronski (Wroński means of the crow or crow-like) and Bonaventura Wójcik (Wójcik means little warrior or soldier’s son) have perfectly appropriate and correctly formed names. Ladislaw Zamojski bears a very historically significant Polish noble surname of toponymic origin, though it is not particularly rare. Slightly more unusual is Wladyslaw Wolfke. This very rare surname was made famous by the Polish physicist Mieczysław Wolfke, but it is more commonly associated with Eastern European Jewish communities and the Yiddish language. It is a hypocoristic (affectionate shortening) of the Germanic name Wolf.

Players with Polish surnames have also represented the United States national team at various times — Quentin Kowalski and Greg Ruczinski. Another American Quidditch player, Maximus Brankovitch III, carries a Serbian surname — and not just any surname, but one belonging to the famous Branković dynasty. The last ruler of the Serbian Despotate, Đurađ Branković, came from this line.

Finally, in Ron Weasley’s favorite team, the Chudley Cannons, there once played a rather terrible player named Dragomir Gorgovitch. He appears to be Serbian, but the surname Gorgović is extremely rare among Serbs. I could find only one real bearer: the Serbian pianist Andjelka Gorgović, who participated in the Ohrid Summer music festival in 1989. The surname is far more common in Ukraine, but a Ukrainian would be highly unlikely to have the distinctly South Slavic first name Dragomir.