Home > Geoespatial / GIS > Mapping your surname

Mapping your surname

Reading Spatial Sustain I got informed there’s a Dynastree application that thematizes a map according to the abundance of your surname. It’s a reminder that maps are in fashion.

clip_image001Let’s try with Álvarez, in Spain

It’s so easy, you type and then press the search button; as a result, provinces are painted according to six classes. As expected, there’s much red as from there comes the surname.

The service also features other statistical data such as:

  • In Spain there are 284,238 persons registered with the surname Álvarez and there are approximately 757,968 persons with this last name.clip_image002
  • Alvarez is 16th most common surname in Spain.
  • These people live in 52 provinces. The highest number of occurrences is given in Asturias: 45,978.
  • Other provinces with abundant occurrences are Madrid (37 602), Barcelona (21 737), León (18,170), Pontevedra (16 873), Sevilla (12 606), Orense (11,768), Santa Cruz de Tenerife (8859), Vizcaya (7028) and La Coruña (6842).
  • You can also view the results by autonomy, similar surnames and know the most popular surnames.

For America it’s only available for United States and Canada, for Europe it exists for Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Poland, apart from Spain.

Notice how popular is Alvarez’s surname in United States, considering a relative number from its phonebook:

clip_image003

Just in border’s states with Mexico and cities which have many Latin immigrants and the area bordering Ontario, Canada.

It is not bad, even the page has other uses.

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.