What would you think of Zajac as a first name?
If you ask me about my first impression, I would be wondering whether it’s a Slavic name. It sounds like a surname to me. I have never heard of it.
I would pronounce it differently depending on where I would encounter the name. So I would want to know a bit more context on where you live or what culture the name is from to better be able to place it.
It is a Surname. It’s a surname from Poland, for more information click here. I mostly thought of it because I was inspired by [name_m]Travis[/name_m] Zajac.
As for the pronunciation, It would be like Zay-[name_m]Jack[/name_m].
This makes sense! The name means “hare”, which was my guess also based on the Bosnian word for it being “zec”.
I’m not Polish, but Slavic, so my guessed pronunciation for this name would be ZAH-yahts.
I’m not familiar with [name_m]Travis[/name_m] Zajac, so I don’t know how big of an association that would be for people.
[name_f]Do[/name_f] you have Polish ancestry?
Polish speaker here! I can confirm that it’s a common surname/vocabulary word, meaning “hare”.
The correct spelling is Zając, and the correct pronunciation is “ZY-o(n)ts”. The first syllable rhymes with “eye”, and the second with “once”.
Pronouncing it “zay-jack” feels like an exaggerated degree of anglicisation to me. I understand that it’s never going to be possible to insist on a native pronunciation of foreign-origin names, but “zay-jack” sounds almost like a joke mispronunciation to me, sorry!
Reminds me of Prozac, to be honest. With the zay-jack pronunciation, it sounds like a medicine. I’m not a big fan, sorry!