Černý (Czech pronunciation: [ˈtʃɛrniː]), rendered without diacritics as Cerny, is a common Czech surname. Originally, it is an adjective in the Czech language, meaning "black"; like many other surnames, this originally made reference to a person's physical qualities, namely dark hair colour or perhaps darker complexion.
Cognate surnames exist in other Slavic-speaking countries, e.g. Čierny in Slovak, Czarny in Polish, Cherny (Chorny) (Чёрный) in Russian, though they are not as prolific as in the Czech Republic. There also exist Anglicised, Germanised or Polonised forms (Cherny, Tscherny, or Czerny, respectively), and other mutations.
Surnames with the meaning "black" also exist in many other languages, including German (Schwarz and its variants), English (Black), Chinese (黑 Hēi), etc.
Related surnames include Černík, Chernenko, Chernov, etc.
Unlike the majority of Czech surnames (and those of other Slavic languages), Černý does not use the suffix -ová for its female form. Instead, since the name is derived from an adjective, the feminine form of that adjective is used. This yields Černá in Czech, Čierna in Slovak, Czarna in Polish, etc.
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