[Facts] Re: Where does the surname Karkkainen come from?
in reply to a message by StephanieTheLioness
The great Lord Google replied that the Finnish diminutive -nen has been used to form surnames from nicknames for about half a millenium, and kärkäs means eager. The odd phonetic shape of kärkäs may be because it is borrowed back from a Saami derivative of a Finnish loan of original Finnish kere/tä into Saami.