Find out how popular the last name Tatar is in the United States and learn more about the meaning, history, and race and ethnic origin of people in America who are named Tatar.

Tatar, like all of the last names we have data for, is identified by the U.S. Census Bureau as a surname which has more than 100 occurrences in the United States in the Decennial Census survey. The most recent statistics we have for the Tatar surname is from the 2010 census data.

Popularity of Tatar in America

Tatar is the 23804th most popular name in America based on the data we have collected from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The Tatar surname appeared 1,062 times in the 2010 census and if you were to sample 100,000 people in the United States, approximately 0 people would have the surname Tatar.

We can also compare 2010 data for Tatar to data from the previous census in 2000. The table below contains all of the statistics for both years in a side-by-side comparison.

The history of the last name Tatar

The surname TATAR has its origins in the Tatar people, a Turkic ethnic group native to the Eurasian steppes. The name first appeared in the 13th century during the Mongol Empire, when the Tatars formed an integral part of the Golden Horde.

The word "Tatar" is derived from the Turkic root "tat", which means "nomad" or "wanderer". It was initially used as an exonym by Russians and Europeans to refer to various Turkic and Mongolic peoples of the Eurasian steppe.

One of the earliest recorded uses of the surname TATAR can be found in the Velvet Book, a medieval Polish document from the 15th century, which lists several individuals with this name. Another early mention is in the Codex Cumanicus, a linguistic manuscript from the 13th century that contains Tatar vocabulary.

In the 16th century, the TATAR surname appeared in the registers of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which had a significant Tatar population due to the settlement of Tatar warriors and their families in the region.

Several notable historical figures have borne the surname TATAR, including Jan Tatar (1688-1768), a Polish-Lithuanian military commander and diplomat, and Ahmed Tatar (1590-1666), a Crimean Tatar poet and scholar known for his works in the Chagatai language.

Another prominent individual with this surname was Petr Tatar (1629-1699), a Russian military leader and diplomat who played a crucial role in the Russian conquest of Siberia and the establishment of Russian settlements in the Far East.

In the 19th century, the TATAR surname gained prominence in the Russian Empire, with individuals such as Alexey Tatar (1825-1892), a Russian painter and academic known for his landscapes and genre scenes.

One of the most famous bearers of the TATAR surname was Mirza Fatali Akhundov (1812-1878), an Azerbaijani playwright, philosopher, and author, regarded as one of the founding figures of modern Azerbaijani literature and literary criticism.

Race and ethnic origin of people with the last name Tatar

We also have some data on the ancestry of people with the surname Tatar.

The below race categories are the modified race categories used in the Census Bureau's population estimates program. All people were categorized into six mutually exclusive racial and Hispanic origin groups:

1. White only
2. Black only
3. American Indian and Alaskan Native only
4. Asian and Pacific Islander only
5. Hispanic
6. Two or More Races

For the most recent 2010 census data, the race/ethnic origin breakdown for Tatar was:

Note: Any fields showing (S) means the data was suppressed for privacy so that the data does not in any way identify any specific individuals.

Since we have data from the previous census in 2000, we can also compare the values to see how the popularity of Tatar has changed in the 10 years between the two census surveys.

Data source

The last name data and ethnic breakdown of last names is sourced directly from the Decennial Census survey, conducted every 10 years by the United States Census Bureau.

The history and meaning of the name Tatar was researched and written by our team of onomatology and genealogy experts.

If you have a correction or suggestion to improve the history of Tatar, please contact us.

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