Dutch name lived, by the suffix -ma or -stra ( of Frisian), or -ing or -ink (of Low Saxon origin). Examples: Dijkstra (after a dyke near the place they came from); Halbertsma ( after an ancestor called Halbert); Wiebing ( after an ancestor called Wiebe); Hesselink ( after an ancestor called Hessel). After 1811, many patronymics became permanent surnames such that Peeters, Jansen, Willems are common surnames today. The most common Dutch surnames in the Netherlands (as of 1947) and Flanders in Belgium are listed to the right. Meertens' Dutch surname database lists 94143 different family names; the total Dutch speaking population
History of the Dutch language language are Belgium, the Netherlands, Suriname, Aruba and Curacao. Within the Indo-European language tree, Dutch is grouped within the Germanic languages, which means it shares a common ancestor with languages such as English, German, and Scandinavian languages. This common, but not direct, ancestor (proto-language) of all contemporary Germanic languages is called "Proto-Germanic", commonly assumed to have originated in approximately the mid-1st millennium BC in Iron Age northern Europe. All Germanic languages are united by subjection to the sound shifts of Grimm's law and Verner's law which originated Proto-Germanic. These two laws define the basic differentiating features of Germanic languages that