Coat of arms of Costa family in Portugal

Costa (Italian: [ˈkɔsta], Portuguese: [ˈkɔʃtɐ, ˈkɔstɐ], Galician: [ˈkɔstɐ], Spanish: [ˈkosta], Catalan: [ˈkɔstə, ˈkɔsta]), sometimes Costas, da Costa, Da Costa, or Dalla Costa, is an Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Galician, Catalan, French, and Greek mostly toponymic surname. The surname spread throughout the world through colonization. It was also a surname chosen by former Jews due to Roman Catholic and other Christian (often forced) conversions.

In Italy, Portugal, Galicia and Catalonia it is derived from the Latin word costa, "rib", which has come to mean slope, coast (close to the sea, or coastline locations) in Romance languages. In Spain, it originates from Catalonia or Galicia, with the Spanish (Castilian) equivalent being Cuesta.[1]

Mediaeval Galician inscription in a 14th-century house, in Noia: "ESTAS CASAS MANDOU FAZER VASCO DA COSTA, ERA DE MCCCLXXVII" These houses were ordered by Vasco da Costa, era 1377 (1339 AD)

Geographical distribution

As of 2014, 71.0% of all known bearers of the surname Costa were residents of Brazil (frequency 1:141), 7.6% of Portugal (1:67), 5.2% of Mozambique (1:255), 3.7% of Italy (1:801), 2.4% of the United States (1:7,460), 1.9% of Guinea-Bissau (1:44), 1.5% of Spain (1:1,531), 1.2% of East Timor (1:49) and 1.2% of Argentina (1:1,809).

In Brazil, the frequency of the surname was higher than national average (1:141) in the following states:

  1. Maranhão (1:46)
  2. Amapá (1:60)
  3. Pará (1:74)
  4. Roraima (1:77)
  5. Acre (1:93)
  6. Rio Grande do Norte (1:97)
  7. Amazonas (1:98)
  8. Ceará (1:112)
  9. Bahia (1:112)
  10. Tocantins (1:113)
  11. Sergipe (1:117)
  12. Piauí (1:119)
  13. Paraíba (1:120)
  14. Alagoas (1:131)
  15. Federal District (1:131)
  16. Minas Gerais (1:140)

In Italy, the frequency of the surname was higher than national average (1:801) in the following regions:

  1. Liguria (1:214)
  2. Sicily (1:374)
  3. Piedmont (1:458)
  4. Veneto (1:489)
  5. Emilia-Romagna (1:676)
  6. Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol (1:763)
  7. Lombardy (1:784)

In Spain, the frequency of the surname was higher than national average (1:1,531) in the following autonomous communities:[2]

  1. Balearic Islands (1:399)
  2. Catalonia (1:667)
  3. Galicia (1:672)
  4. Region of Murcia (1:845)
  5. Valencian Community (1:1,001)

People

Fictional characters

Dalla Costa

See also

This page lists people with the surname Costa.
If an internal link intending to refer to a specific person led you to this page, you may wish to change that link by adding the person's given name(s) to the link.

References

  1. ^ Coromines, Joan (2008). Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana (1a. ed. en esta colección. ed.). Madrid: Gredos. p. 154. ISBN 978-84-473-5862-5.
  2. ^ Costa surname distribution
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