I think everyone should have the same last name in a family, it's going to make everything much less confusing. Since I'm a traditional type person, that would be the husband's name. When people want to be non-traditional about last name stuff, they run into issues and drama like this. Not worth it in my opinion.
I almost put a disclaimer in my initial post that I wanted to focus on the topic at hand, and not discuss traditional approaches to naming as that would be off topic, but I thought it wouldn't be necessary.
Yes, we were non-traditional as we got married later in life and both had prior careers, degrees and published articles. We both spent 30+ years with our own last names, and both fully agreed and thought it right we keep our own last names. (Consider also the "traditional" approach - which mind you, is first, a fallacious argument to make for why to do something, called appeal to tradition, and second, it's only tradition in some cultures - is based off women being treated as property, which is shall we say politely, a less than desirable reason to provide support for a "tradition".)
Anyway. Let's get back to the original question?
Not allowed to be used though? Can you elaborate, I'm super curious!
Yes this is interesting.
My husband's family (some of them) are from Denmark. One of his grandparents or great grandparents was a decorated Naval Officer, so he was granted his own last name.
That's a big deal. There are very few people with this last name left.
Otherwise, the family tree was Niels Petersen, Peter Nielsen, Niels Petersen, Peter Nielsen, Peter Petersen...ad nauseum.
Interesting (and a compelling reason)! Sadly, nothing distinguishing like that for us. One side has a father whose actions saving people was part of a best-selling novel & movie. The other has a father who has published important scientific papers.