Giant Footnote

This one is for the Brokish readers out there.

Jiří, my Contemporary Central European Politics instructor, has a knack for guessing the origins of last names. “Brokish… clearly English,” he stated as he marked me present and moved on to the next surname. Once the list was exhausted, chairs were haphazardly shoved to the table, and students exited the room, happy to be done with the three-hour marathon-of-a-class. I approached the man who possessed an explosive enthusiasm that propelled each sentence from his mouth.

“Jiří,” I began, hesitant to correct him, “I believe my name is actually of Bohemian origin… something about being changed at Ellis Island from Prokish?”

“AHA! Yes! I see it now! It was Prokeš!” He wrote it for me on the board. “A reasonably common first name for girls. I can see how the P might become a B at Ellis… yes… interesting.” I thanked him. “Goodbye, Kevin!” he said to me in Czech, as if we were now brothers. “Na shledanou!” I replied as I walked out the door.

Prokeš is pronounced “PROKE-esh.” Roll the ‘R’ if you can.*

Also, it should be noted that Czech women add -ova to their last names, so any female Brokish’s out there would be Prokešova (PROKE-esh-oh-vah).

*Don’t worry if you can’t—Václav Havel, the much loved former president of the Czech Republic had trouble with his ‘R’s, and the people loved him anyway.