soldier name; military name

MN

the name which a person may take by virtue of service in the military as a fixed surname; the s. n. was in practice often equivalent to what we now call the family name; among the Romans the s. n. was their agnomen; among the Scandinavians the s. n. used to compete with the farm name, and the clerical name, for use as a substitute for the patronymic; cf. Chapter 3, §3, ¶7