Why do some Japanese camera brands use names like Fujica/Fujinon or Yashica/Yashinon?

Question

I’ve noticed that some older Japanese camera makers used one name for the camera body and a slightly different one for their lenses—for example Fujica/Fujinon, Yashica/Yashinon, and Zenza/Zenzanon. Other brands also used distinctive lens names such as Nikkor, Rokkor, Takumar, Hexanon, and Zuiko.

Is there any real link to the Japanese language behind suffixes like “-non” or “-ca,” or were these simply marketing/trade-name conventions adopted within the camera industry?

user603 · Accepted Answer

Lens Suffixes

Here are a few more Japanese lens names:

Konica called their lenses "Hexanon"
Konica also had a cheaper line of "Hexar" lenses
Nikon used to call their lenses "Nikkor"
Some Minolta lenses were called "Rokkor"
Minolta also had some named "Celtic"
Asahi (Pentax) lenses were called "Takumar"
Fuji (as noted in question) uses "Fujinon"
Olympus calls theirs "Zuiko"
Canon just calls theirs "Canon"

Of those:

Takumar is apparently named after Takuma Kajiwara, who was the brother of the founder of Asahi, the (original) parent of Pentax.
Zuiko apparently comes from a couple of the characters in the name "Mizuho Optical Research Laboratory".
Rokkor comes from the name of a mountain near Osaka, Japan.

So that mostly just widens the question a little bit--where did "ar", "or" and "on" suffixes come from?

I'd guess the answer is that they were mostly inspired by the names of some of the German lenses that dominated when Japan was entering the camera/lens market.

Goerz Dagor
Leica Summicron
Leica Summitar
Leica Elmar
Zeiss Biogon
Zeiss Biotar
Zeiss Distagon
Zeiss Tessar
Voigtlander Skopar
Voigtlander Skopagon
Schneider Xenar
Schneider Xenon
Rodenstock Imagon
Rodenstock Heligon

There are at least a few dozen more that I haven't listed here, but you get the general idea--when the Japanese got involved these suffixes were all in fairly wide use.

The earliest German lens using the "ar" suffix seems to be the Ziess Unar, from the 1890s (but possibly the Goerz Frontar, which is from around the same time frame). I haven't been able to find much about where the "ar" suffix came from in either of those cases. Goerz had quite a variety of names, and I think that element of that name just happened to get copied.

In the Zeiss line, shortly after the Unar came the Protar. Those were then "bred together"¹ to produce the Tessar. By then, it was starting to form a pattern for Zeiss lenses.

From there, the spread of names is often fairly easy to trace--for example, the Leica Elmar and Schneider Xenar are basically Tessar clones.

The "on" suffix seems to go back to the Goerz Hypergon. Like the Frontar, I haven't been able to find a real source for that name.

The "or" suffix probably comes from the Goerz Dagor. "Dagor" is apparently an initialism for "Double Anastigmatic Goerz Optical Refractor". The Dagor design was extremely successful, and has formed the basis of an immense number of lens designs since.

Camera Suffix

I'd guess the "ca" for cameras probably comes chiefly from Leica (which, if I recall correctly, is more or less a contraction of "Leitz Camera".

There were a lot of other cameras around at the time, of course, but Leica was clearly the one to beat (or at least imitate) at the time. For that matter, there's a fair argument that it still is.

References

Almost literally--a Tessar is basically the front elements of an Unar with the rear elements of a Protar.