Madrid
A surname taken from the Spanish capital, originally identifying someone from Madrid.
The #1,364 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 11,942 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Madrid is a habitational surname from the city of Madrid in Spain. The place-name is usually explained from an older Iberian form, often reconstructed as Latinized Matritum or an earlier local name, though the deeper origin of the city name itself is debated. As a surname, it simply meant “person from Madrid” or “of Madrid.”
History
Spanish and Spanish-American use of Madrid as a surname follows the common pattern of adopting a place-name to identify origin. It would have been especially natural for someone who moved away from the city or for families connected with the capital. In the modern period the surname is also found in the Americas through Spanish colonial and later migration.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Because Madrid is also a famous capital city, the surname is immediately recognisable as a geographic name in many languages.
From the historical record
“Spanish name Zapata ; and zapdta, zapdto is a kind of half-boot. Mellado gives three Spaniards of the name of Zapata — Antonio Zapata de Cisneros, a cardinal, born at Madrid in 1550 ; Antonio LUDUS PATRONYMICUS. 99 or Lupian Zapata, born at Segorbe in the seventeenth century ;”
— Ludus Patronymicus; or, the etymology of curious surnames