A kunya serves as an
honorific in place of, or alongside,
given names in the
Arab and
Islamic worlds. Use of the epithet usually signifies some closeness between the speaker and the addressee, but is more formal than using a first name. The
English equivalent would be to call a man "Father of John", if his eldest son is named John. When also using a person's birth name, the honorific precedes the proper name.
Mahmoud Abbas would go by
abū Māzen Maħmūd, for "Mahmud, the father of Mazen". In
Classical Arabic and
Modern Standard Arabic,
abū can change into the forms
abā and
abī (
accusative and
genitive, respectively), depending on its position in the sentence. In romanizations of Arabic names, the words
abū and
abū l- are sometimes perceived as a separate part of the full name. It may also have metaphorical meaning, such as
Abu Hurayra, one of the
Companions of the Prophet Muhammad, meaning "father of the kitten", who was known for his pet cat. Also common are epithets reflecting qualities, such as "
abu al-Afiya" (the Healthy) and "abu al-Barakat" (the Blessed). The epithet may also express the bearer's attachment to something, as in
Abu Bakr, "father of the camel foal", for his love of camels. The honorific may also be a nickname expressing a characteristic of an individual, as in
Umm Kulthum, "mother of the beautiful face", "
Kulthum" being a name with that meaning. It is also frequently used to refer to politicians and other celebrities to indicate respect. Men who do not yet have a child are often addressed by a made-up
kunya, usually from a popular or notable figure in Muslim or
Arab history. Arabs would take the given name and the patronymic of those famous figures and attribute it to that person. For example, the kunya of a man with the given name
Khalid who has no male heir would be Abu Walid, because of the famous Muslim military commander
Khalid ibn al-Walid. The converse is also true: if someone's given name was Walid, his kunya would be Abu Khalid. Less commonly, it may be derived from the name of his father, because it is tradition for men to name their firstborns after their fathers. ==Jewish use==