Virtual Genealogical Association Conference 2020

 

The Virtual Genealogical Association will hold its online conference on November 13^th to 15^th.You can find out more information about on their website. Registration fees are very reasonable considering the lineup of speakers and topics: US$59 for VGA members; US$79 for non-members.

I was fortunate to have been invited to present a talk at this year’s event. My subject will be Surname Origins – Why? When? Why Then? It is based on an article of the same title I wrote for the Journal of One-Name Studies in 2018. My session will be pre-recorded and be viewable before the event begins, as well as during and after of course.

Here is a little teaser about the subject. This information is from my analysis of the Durham Liber Vitae about which I wrote in the aforementioned JOONS article.

Almost all of the names from the 9^th and 10^th centuries from the Durham Liber Vitae manuscript show only a single name for each individual. A pattern began to emerge in the late 12^th century with regard to references to manors, estates and monasteries. In these instances, single names were appended with “de” (of) along with the name of the location of their residence or affiliation and occasionally their title or position.

By the 14^th century, the full use of surnames had begun in earnest, many of them modified from those locative descriptions, but many also from occupations in which individuals or families had been engaged, positions in the community, familial relationships or physical traits (together I refer to as descriptive). During the same, and later periods the use of locative descriptions declined. Last names also began, with spelling variations, to look more “modern” or what we would recognize today.

By the end of the 15^th century, the use of single names and references to areas or residences (manors or monasteries) were almost non-existent.

Many other medieval sources have also been reviewed and will be highlighted in the talk. All of them show similar timing in the introduction and use of surnames.

So, was there an underlying reason why people began to use, or at least to be recorded with a surname, after nearly 1,000 years (post-Roman Empire) of non-use? Why did it seem not to occur until the 14^th century? Was it in response to political or societal shifts, coincidentally across almost all of Europe? Or was it because of something else?

Those are the questions we will investigate in my presentation.

I hope many of you can join in and listen to many of what looks to be interesting and valuable genealogical research talks.

Using Google Alert...

... to find information about people and places.

I subscribe to many different email lists, primarily, but not exclusively to do with areas in which we had ancestors living. While many posts have nothing to do with our family, there are often interesting tidbits and advice that might assist us in designing and completing a search for people and events. It should not be surprising that most genealogists share similar problems in finding and interpreting information – messed up indexes, spelling differences, confusion about parentage, etc.

Another source I use is Google Alert. Through this service, I keep track of news about: Cornwood in Devon, where my Shepheard ancestors came from; Plympton also in Devon, where many events occurred in the past that affected my ancestors; and of course, Shepheard, in order to find out where any people with my surname might be living, some of whom may be distant relatives.

Many alerts are just current news reports about events and people, but occasionally they have to do with historical information. This week I was alerted to an individual who wrote about his Shepheard ancestors in Surrey. There is no doubt we share the same spelling of our surname, so it was interesting to see where his family lived. See Chris Shepheard’s Peeps into the Past.

The alert was about a painting he had commissioned to show store front that had housed a business run by his grandparents. A photo of the family standing in front of the building was used to recreate the site.

It reminded me of a water colour I had done depicting the Shepheard ancestral home in Cornwood as it might have looked in the late 19^th century. It is a great idea to take old or new photos and have someone turn it into a picture you can hang on your wall that shows the place where your ancestors lived.

 

Water colour of East Rooke, Cornwood Parish, Devon by Christine Pascoe

Anyway, Chris used the picture to comment on his family members, a nice vignette that related his own connection to the past. I know he will also treasure the painting which will continue to bring up many more memories.

If you are looking for ways to find relatives or learn about areas where your family members lived and worked, Google Alert is one way to find connections you might otherwise miss. Click on the link and find out how.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Be aware, though, that any link from sources such as this, while helpful, may also take you to sites that could have viruses. Do not open anything you do not trust. It's always a good idea to have your anti-virus software up to date as well, for any browsing of the Internet.

Some of the Perils of Online Databases 4

Following up on my posts about problems one might encounter in online databases (Some of the Perils of Online Databases – one, two and three) here is another wrinkle I found in the various databases. This one concerns missing information.

James Shepheard

Sometimes the Clerk or Vicar had lost his notes when it came time to fill in the register.  In this case it was my great-grandfather that he forgot! With just the baptism register information it would have been almost impossible to figure out who this individual was and what family he or she belonged to. As it happened, he was the first person I started looked for in this area, as he was the last of my direct line to be born there. And I had his birth certificate, so I knew when and where he was born.

A few days earlier, on August 16th, there was a baptism entered for his cousin, Louisa Shepheard (Sheppard on the entry), whose father was not known.

 

Cornwood parish, Devon baptism register entries for Louisa Sheppard (top) and [James] Shepherd; source - source – Plymouth and West Devon Record Office, Birth, Marriage & Death (Parish Registers), retrieved 17 August 2012 from FindMyPast

James, or in this case just the surname Shepherd (that is the way the entry was spelled), does not turn up on any search on Ancestry, FindMyPast, TheGenealogist or FamilySearch. Even variations of the name spelling turn up no baptism for him. Louisa can be found on searches of FindMyPast and FamilySearch and both sites have copies of the baptism register page. She does not come up on searches of Ancestry or TheGenealogist.

Both children were registered with civil authorities with the surname Shepheard.

Remedies

If you cannot locate information about an individual on either indexes or images, do a broader search of an area, on several databases or different types of sources to try to locate the basic data. And let the database owner know so that they can correct their database or add the relevant information.