The Markow Family Tree

Meyer Shimonov was born in about 1758 or 59, probably in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The 1795 census has him living in Pologi (Polohy) and lists him as a leaseholder of mills and a tavern. He did not have a last name yet. His wife Sura Avrumova was far too young to be the mother of his first two children Shimon and Benyumin, which means that she was not his first wife. An 1808 list of rural leaseholders has Meyer Shimonov listed as a leaseholder in Glushki (Hlushky), a village about 10km away from Pologi. For the first time, he appears with a last name: MIRKO. The same list says that he is required to move to Belaya Tserkov in 1809. The 1816 census has him living in Belaya Tserkov, and with the last name MARKOV. He died in 1817. Probably their first surname adopted around 1805 was MEYERKOV, which did not survive in the documents. They soon Slavicized it to the similar-sounding MIRKO, and then to MARKOV.