I
am taking a genealogy course right now called Introduction to
One-Name Studies, from Pharos
Teaching and Tutoring Limited. The purpose, for me at least, is to learn
more about how to search for and compile information about the surnames in my
family.
One
can only go back so far, of course. We are restricted by the availability of
records about people, usually terminating in the 1500s. We are also limited in
our reviews by the way in which people spelled their names or, more to the
point, how others spelled them when entering information into BMD registers or
other official documents. I wrote about some of the ways my own surname was
recorded in my post
of May 13, 2014.
Of
interest to many people, though, is how their families got their name in the
first place. With my family, we can probably assume that, way back when, some
ancestor was a sheep-herder. Where we got the double vowel is another question
entirely.
There
are many ways in which surnames came into use. In most of Europe naming systems
are patronymic, that is, children are given the same surname as their father or
at least named with respect to the father. For some common surnames such as
Anderson or Thompson, both of which appear in my family tree, it seems obvious
that a child might originally have been referenced as being the son of Andrew
or Thomas. Many countries have specific endings for males or females: -sen and –datter
for sons or daughters, respectively, in Denmark; -s, -se or –sen for children
of either gender in the Netherlands; -wicz for sons or –ovna for daughters in
Poland. Some names designated birth status. “Fitz” apparently preceded a name
in France or Old England for children who were illegitimate – FitzGerald.
English
names do not seem to designate between the sexes. My wife’s 4th
great-grandmother’s last name, according to the parish records of the Shetland
Islands, was Edwardsdaughter. a practice that may have come from the Viking
settlers of the region.
Other
surnames arose from: the occupation of an individual – Carpenter, Cooper or,
yes, Shepherd; the location near where he lived – examples being Hill, Brook or
York; or personal characteristics – Tall, Short or Smart.
The
first group of people to use surnames was the nobility, mostly for describing
where they were from or what lands they controlled. Surnames seem to have come
into use following the Crusades or at least during the Middle Ages. Quite
possibly, as population expanded significantly during this period, it became
more necessary to differentiate people with the use of some description. A boy
named John, whose father was William, became John, son of William or
Williamson. A girl name Mary, whose father was a blacksmith, might be called
Mary Smith. Her friend might be Mary Mason because her father worked as a stonecutter.
There
is an interesting website called Behind
the Name where one can search for the source and usage of a given surname.
For example, one of my wife’s 3rd great-grandfathers was Alexander Jenkins.
Jenkin is apparently “from the given name Jenkin, a medieval diminutive of Jen,
itself a Middle English form of John.” So Jenkin might be Little John and Jenkins
might be child of Little John? Jenkins is quite a common name – ranking number
83 out of 88,799 surnames on the 1990 USA census and 97 out of 500 on the 1991 England
and Wales census.
The
search for meanings and origins of family names can be both fascinating and
frustrating. The farther one goes back, the more difficult it becomes to trace
surnames but a real treat when you discover a new document that names a related
individual.
Wayne
Shepheard is a volunteer with the Online Parish Clerk program in
England, handling four parishes in Devon, England. He has
published a number of articles about various aspects of genealogy and is a past
Editor of Chinook, the quarterly
journal of the Alberta Family Histories Society. Wayne also provides
genealogical consulting services through his business, Family History Facilitated.
