Kotowski

Kotowski [ kɔˈtɔfski ] is an originally Polish family name .

Frequency and spellings

Up to 6500 people carry the family name in Poland and around 700 people in German-speaking countries. In Polish it is declined to Kotowska [ kɔˈtɔfska ] for female carriers and in the plural to Kotowscy [ kɔˈtɔfst͡sɨ ]. In addition, the surname has developed into the rarer spelling variants Kotowsky (mainly found in Austria ) and Kotovsky and Kotovská (popular in the Czech Republic and Slovakia ). In connection with transcriptions from the Cyrillic alphabet , the spelling variants Kotowskij and Kotowskaja also exist . In Romanian the spelling variant Cotovschi developed from this .

History and use

Bearers of the family name come from both the nobility and the peasantry . Depending on the bearer, it is a name of origin , referring to localities with the same sound, or a family name derived from medieval surnames . The prefix Kot [ ˈkɔt ] contained in the family name is in some cases such an epithet and means cat in Polish .

The oldest surviving and documented mentions of the family name as a noble name date back to the 17th century and refer to the noble military Konstanty Kotowski and the Royal Steward Adam Kotowski . In the former Galicia , two noble families with the family name were listed in the nobility register from 1782, one belonging to the Trzaska coat of arms community and originating from the Polish region of Rawa , and the other belonging to the Pomian coat of arms community and from the Lithuanian region of Samogitia . Other bearers of the family name who belonged to the Polish nobility were members of the coat of arms communities Kierdeja , Łada , Pobóg and Puchała .

During the Second World War , numerous members of the Polish resistance used the name as a pseudonym. In the novel The Emancipated by the Polish author Bolesław Prus , which was also performed several times as a play and published in 1893, one of the main characters was named Student Kotowski . The Polish author Krystyna Piotrowska-Breger also published a children's book in 2010 under the title Ja, Kotowski . Furthermore, the street Ulica Kotowskiego in Krakow was named after the Polish educator Florian Kotowski and in Skulsk the Skwer Kotowskich promenade was named after the family of the former Jewish community leader Yizhak Kotowski .

Name bearer

• Adam Kotowski (1626–1693), Polish head coach under King Jan Sobieski
• Albert Stefan Kotowski (* 1949), Polish historian and professor at the University of Bydgoszcz
• Alexander Kotowski (* 1996), German table tennis player
• Alfons Kotowski (1899–1944), Polish major and resistance fighter in World War II
• Alfons Michael Kotowski (1903–1994), German chemist
• Alicja Jadwiga Kotowska (1899–1939), beatified religious sister of the Roman Catholic Church
• Anatoli Haritonowitsch Kotowski (1921–1992), Ukrainian writer
• Antoni Kotowski (1784–1845), Polish canon, metropolitan and publicist
• Barbara Kotowska (* 1966), Polish modern pentathlete and two-time world champion
• Bolesław Kotowski (1908–1996), Polish politician in exile
• Cerstin Richter-Kotowski (* 1962), German politician (CDU) and member of the Berlin House of Representatives
• Damazy Kotowski (1861–1943), Polish impressionist painter
• Dan Kotowski (* 1967), American politician (DP) and former senator of the US state Illinois
• Edward Kotowski (* 1941), Polish art historian and resident of the former Polish State Security Service
• Elke-Vera Kotowski (* 1961), German literary scholar and writer
• Eugeniusz Kotowski (1922–1992), Polish animation film director
• Feliks Kotowski (1895–1929), Polish agronomist and university professor
• Ferdynand Kotowski , Polish liturgy composer
• Florian Kotowski († 1940), Polish educator and activist
• Florian Leon Kotowski († 1704), Polish marshal and member of the Sejm
• Georg Kotowski (1920–1999), German politician (CDU) and former member of the Bundestag
• Grigori Grigoryevich Kotowski (1923–2001), Soviet anthropologist and historian
• Grigori Iwanowitsch Kotowski (1881–1925), Soviet general and communist revolutionary
• Henry Kotowski (1944–2019), German musician
• Jan Erazm Kotowski (1885–1960), Polish painter of realism
• Jan Michael Kotowski (* 1979), German-American political scientist and lecturer at the University of Santa Cruz
• Janusz Kotowski (* 1966), Polish politician (PiS) and mayor of the Mazovian city of Ostrołęka
• Jerzy Kotowski (1925–1979), Polish cameraman and film director
• Katarzyna Kotowska (* 1956), Polish writer, illustrator and winner of the Hans Christian Andersen Literature Prize
• Kazimierz Kotowski (* 1951), Polish politician (PSL) and member of the Sejm
• Konrad Kotowski (1940–2008), German cameraman and winner of the Locarno Film Festival Camera Prize
• Konstanty Kotowski (1610–1665), Polish conspirator, marshal and colonel in the Lithuanian cavalry
• Krzysztof Kotowski (* 1966), Polish writer
• Ludwig Iwanowitsch Kotowski (1900–1947), Ukrainian architect and town planner
• Ludwik Kotowski (1911–1994), Polish first lieutenant and resistance fighter in World War II
• Maciej Kotowski (* 1975), Canadian-Polish economist and professor at Harvard University
• Maja Kotowskaja (* 1979), Russian pop musician
• Mariusz Kotowski (* 1967), Polish publicist, film director and producer of numerous Hollywood films
• Michael Franklin Kotowski (* 1941), American politician (DP) and former mayor of the Californian city of Campbell
• Michał Marian Kotowski (1862–1916), Polish theater actor
• Mirko Kotowski (* 1980), German soccer player
• Monika Kotowska (1942–2012), Polish writer and screenwriter
• Olha Kotowska (* 1983), Ukrainian athlete
• Paul Kotowski (1904–1971), German physicist
• Paweł Kotowski (1777–1849), Polish historian and Piarist brother
• Ralf Kotowski (* 1940), former dissident and prisoner of the Ministry for State Security in the GDR
• Tadeusz Kotowski , Polish theologian and missionary of the Roman Catholic Church in Brazil
• Timo Kotowski (* 1978), German journalist
• Witold Kotowski (1893–1969), Polish realism painter
• Włodzimierz Kotowski (* 1928), Polish chemist and professor at the Opole University of Technology
• Yizhak Kotowski , Polish-Jewish politician and former head of the Greater Poland rural community of Skulsk
• Zbigniew Kotowski (* 1959), Polish painter of photorealism

See also

• Palais Kotowski , a baroque city palace from the 17th century in Warsaw
• Kotowskie , a village in the Polish Greater Poland Voivodeship
• Kotowske , a number of places in Ukraine
• Kotovsk , several cities in the former Soviet Union

literature

• Polish Biographical Index: Kotowski by Gabriele Baumgartner, Saur, Munich 2004, p. 791, ISBN 3-598-34506-2
• From Dirschau to Thorn. Chronicle Kotowski (1800–1920) by Peter Michael Kotowski, SV, Kassel 1991, without ISBN

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Surname meanings and statistics (English)
2. ↑ Rozmieszczenie nazwiska Kotowskich w Polsce (Polish)
3. ↑ Digital surname dictionary of Germany (German)
4. ↑ Baza polskich nazwisk (Polish and German)
5. ↑ Program gromadzenia wiedzy o genealogii rodziny Kotowski (Polish)
6. ↑ Od chłopa pańszczyźnianego do szlachcica (Polish)
7. ↑ The nobility of Galicia, Ladomeria and Bukovina (German)
8. ↑ Dynamiczny herbarz rodzin polskich (Polish)
9. ↑ Family tree entries for the family name Kotowski (German)
10. ↑ Powstańcze biogramy ( Memento of the original from May 18, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (Polish) 
11. ↑ Uczczono pamięć skulskich Żydów ( Memento of the original April 28, 2016 Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link is automatically inserted and not yet tested. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (Polish) 
12. ↑ Yizhak Kotowski to be memorialized in forgotten Polish Jewish community of Skulsk (English)